


Petting Zoo

by airandangels



Category: Steven Universe (Cartoon)
Genre: Alcohol, Alternate Universe - Human, Dildos, F/F, Female Ejaculation, Groping, Group Sex, Human AU, Master/Pet, Masturbation, Menstruation, Mildly Dubious Consent, Oral Sex, Phone Sex, Public Masturbation, Public Transportation, Recreational Drug Use, Selfies, Semi-Public Sex, Sex Toys, Squirting, Teasing, Texting, Vaginal Fingering, at first, body issues, copious goosh, no psychological realism, not that much physical realism either probably
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2017-03-25
Updated: 2018-07-07
Packaged: 2018-10-10 08:28:29
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 10
Words: 68,859
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/10433589
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/airandangels/pseuds/airandangels
Summary: Human AU in which uptight businesswoman Holly encounters a rowdy group of young women on the subway and something quite strange begins between them.  I don't normallydohuman AUs but then Holly doesn't normally do Amethysts.(N.B. The title is Petting Zoo purely because that's what I call this ship.  I am bad at thinking of appropriate titles and I think Petting Zoo is funny.)





	1. Chapter 1

The morning subway ride was never exactly salubrious but at least it wasn’t usually actively obnoxious; Holly had cultivated an excellent Fuck Off Aura that meant she wasn’t usually approached or bothered by anyone, and as she reached the end of her thirties she knew she was approaching sexual invisibility anyway.  She drank her coffee and read the news on her phone and made the most of the time to prepare her mind for the working day.

She couldn’t work out what people like them were doing  _ up _ so early in the first place.  They came racketing into the train car like an explosion of noise and colour and coarse language, all ripped jeans and backwards caps and hoop earrings and cheap body spray, a pack of big rowdy tomboys.  She wasn’t exactly sure if they counted as a gang.  They didn’t wear a lot of red or blue or have any kind of visible symbol; an awful lot of them seemed to like purple though.  One of them had a dimple stud in her cheek with a glittering amethyst in it; she caught Holly looking at it (wondering how much it had hurt and whether her drinks ever leaked out through it) and flashed her a grin that made her swiftly swivel away, pressing her knees and ankles tightly together and holding her elbows in to her sides to avoid contact as much as possible.

They had a way of completely filling all available space, sprawling in their seats and dangling from the poles and laughing and shouting to each other, tossing things back and forth, practising dance steps, putting on their make-up as if they were in their own bathroom, just  _ obnoxiously _ happy and noisy and large.  It made Holly angry.  If she’d had to hold herself in her entire life, it wasn’t fair that they got to  _ burst  _ all over the place.  

Things came to a head when one of them, completely ignoring her, swung over to dangle from a strap just in front of Holly with her backside like two bowling balls wrapped in tight denim approximately three inches from her nose.  The train went around a corner and she swayed in dangerously; Holly bumped the back of her head on the window pulling back.

“Do you  _ mind _ getting your fat ass out of my face?” she snapped.  

They all shut up for a fraction of a second and then there was a massed, gleeful chorus of “OOOOOooohhhhhh!”  Holly cringed, suddenly sure she was about to be beaten to a pulp.  She had  _ meetings _ today.  She couldn’t be a pulp.  Pulp got left behind and forgotten about at evaluation time.  She wouldn’t have  _ said _ it if she hadn’t hurt her head.

The one in front of her slowly turned and looked down at her, back over her shoulder.  She raised one heavy dark eyebrow.  “I am so  _ terribly _ sorry, Your Highness,” she said.  “I didn’t know  _ your _ fat ass was there.”

As if a guardian angel were intervening, they pulled into a station and the doors hissed open.  “Hey, this is us,” said one of them and they all forgot about her and bundled out, leaving Holly palpitating with relief.  

She hoped she wouldn’t see them again so of course they were on her train, in her car, every single morning.  And they  _ remembered _ her.  They took a somehow simultaneously malicious and playful delight in making her as uncomfortable as humanly possible.  They looked her up and down and smiled to themselves.  They whispered to each other and looked sideways at her and snickered.  At irregular intervals someone would plunk herself down in the seat next to Holly, long legs sprawling, knee nudging hers, flick her eyebrows at her and say “Hey” in a way that sounded absolutely innocuous if you tried to describe it to someone but was absolutely infuriating in person.  She refused to give them a reaction, but her face betrayed her every time, blushing so hard she felt as if her cheeks were sunburnt.

And then they started showing up on the train  _ home _ as well.

The morning train was less crowded, still busy because it was the city that never slept, but there was usually space to sit down because Holly made a point of being early to work.  The evening train was generally packed and it was a rare treat if she didn’t have to stand.  

They weren’t doing this on purpose  _ just _ to harass her, were they?  Did they seriously have nothing better to do?  Were they that obsessed with tormenting her because of one stupid comment that was  _ not _ her fault because they should have had some damn consideration and spatial awareness in the first place?  

But here they were every night, and they had a sinister talent for insinuating their way through crowds — they only moved in between the times you were looking at them, you would never catch one actually on the move, she would just be  _ closer _ the next time you turned to check that side like something in a horror movie — and she found herself pressed in between them, the middle of a cluster of big strapping bodies, pressing in on her, warm and smelling of sweat and smoke and spray-can dry shampoo.  And they’d  _ smile _ at her, and flick their stencilled eyebrows at her, and the one with the amethyst in her cheek would sometimes kiss the air in her general direction, and it was mortifying.  

She would race off the train, power-walk as well as she could in Manolo Blahnik heels to her building, try her hardest not to look like a lunatic riding the elevator up, dive into her apartment and slam the door behind her.  Finally she would fall on her bed and hitch up her neat pencil skirt and wrench down the Spanx that were the only reason it looked so neat and masturbate furiously, swearing under her breath.  She was always so ashamed of herself afterwards, but oh God, she needed the relief.  It was good to have a rich fantasy life but surely something was wrong when it was all about getting molested on the subway by some sort of overgrown juvenile delinquent gang.

How old were they, anyway?  Surely they were all at least twenty.  She  _ hoped _ they were all at least twenty.  

Things escalated one morning when she was in a particularly tense mood.  She hadn’t eaten because there was going to be a breakfast meeting, except perhaps she should have eaten so she wouldn’t eat too  _ much _ at the breakfast meeting, but she didn’t want to look like one of those annoying neurotic women who worried about what she ate, and whose horrible idea was the breakfast meeting anyway, of course it was Bob’s, and she  _ needed  _ Bob to be impressed with her.  Her stomach was a mess of coffee and anxious acid.

And so of course  _ they _ were all sharing a vast paper sack of doughnuts, hot and fresh and wafting the smell of cinnamon sugar and staining the brown paper almost see-through with oil, sucking sugar off their fingers with plump soft lips, and when the one with the ass and the eyebrows had the nerve to shove the bag at her and rustle it, not even so much as a “Would you like one?” Holly glared at her so ferociously that she burst into mocking laughter.

“I’m so sorry, Your Majesty, how could I think you’d want a  _ commoner doughnut?” _ she hooted.

“Queenie only eats the finest cronuts made by, like, elves,” said another one.

“French elves,” said another.

“She’s  _ classy.” _

“She’s  _ fancy.” _

“Not for the likes of  _ us.” _

And then the whole thing turned into a surrealist nightmare because they started singing “Uptown Girl,” loudly, a capella,  _ at _ her, in front of the entire car.

“Stop it!” she hissed, trying to make them hear her without anyone  _ over _ hearing her.  “You stop that right now!”

They sang louder and three of them started dancing in a line.  The one with the stud in her cheek was on her knees singing the “whoa-oh-oh”s and waving her arms, and some people were laughing and oh dear God, at least two were filming on their phones, but more people were annoyed and complaining and the upshot of it was that they were all forcibly ejected three stations short of her stop.  Holly simply could not believe it.  She wasn’t doing anything wrong!  She was the target of completely unjustified and frankly very childish harassment!  She tried to explain but just like a nightmare, no one was listening and she was tangled up in the middle of them and they were on the platform and the train was leaving and she’d twisted her ankle a bit and she was sweating and needed to pee and wanted to  _ scream.   _

She tried and started to hyperventilate instead, a huge croaky whoop of an inhalation followed by panicky wheezing.  

“Whoa, shit, are you okay?”

“You need an inhaler or something?”

“Give her room.” 

“I’ve got a VapoRub thing.”

“That’s for colds, dummy.”

They were all crowding in around her as if they had any right to show concern  _ now. _

“Give her room!”  The one with the stud elbowed some others back.  “Hey.  Miss.  Are you okay?”

_ Miss!   _ “I am the farthest  _ thing _ from okay and it is all your fault!  Do you even realise what you’ve done?  I have to be at this  _ stupid _ breakfast meeting and now I’m going to be  _ late _ and they’ll think I’m unreliable and useless and — and —”  To her horror she realised she might be about to cry.

“Where do you work?” the one with the eyebrows demanded.

“437 Madison.  Blue Diamond Media,” she said, startled into a straight answer.

They exchanged glances and the one with the stud cracked her knuckles.  “Right.”

“Aboveground it is.”

Before Holly could react or even cry out the one with the eyebrows had seized her and thrown her over her shoulder in a fireman’s lift and someone else had her briefcase and someone  _ else _ was drinking her coffee and they were all  _ running _ with her through the morning commuters and up the stairs and along the street, up alleys,  _ through _ buildings, slamming open doors and rushing in without hesitation as if they knew exactly where they were going; at one point they were pelting through the kitchen of a diner (the fry cook high-fived a couple of them) and at another they seemed to be disrupting a music video shoot full of floating feathers and bubbles, and then, all at once, they were there and they were setting her down on the pavement and blowing feathers off her and generally dusting her down and shoving her briefcase into her arms.  Someone patted her firmly on the butt.  She looked at her watch.  Three minutes to spare.  She spun and raced into the building, cringing as she heard a shout of “You’re welcome, bitch!”

She was working too hard to think of them until lunchtime and then she had to admit she felt a little bad.  She could have said thank you.  They would probably get even worse now she’d given them a stronger reason to dislike her.  The only thing she could think of was a peace offering and what were you supposed to do for people like that?  She couldn’t exactly send them a fruit basket care of the subway.  What would they like?  What would appease them?  In the end she pulled herself together and hurried downstairs.  

After all that agonising it would have been typical if they hadn’t been on the evening train, just so she could feel stupid for dwelling on it, but there they were.  Holly wasn’t sure if she felt better or worse about that.  They spotted her and started their purposeful infiltration of the crowd in her direction; she forced herself to stay still and wait.  Here they were looming around her, and there were no lecherous grins now, they all had faces like thunder.  She dug in her coat pocket, briefly feeling the cool outline of the little canister of mace she’d fortunately never had to use and hoped she wouldn’t need now.  

“Here!  Here.  And you, and you, and you.”  She quickly thrust the iTunes cards she’d bought in her lunch break into each of their hands; thank God she had enough of them, she hadn’t been able to remember how many of them there usually were but it seemed to be an even dozen.  They stared at them, seeming nonplussed.  “To say thank you for this morning, and with my apologies for not  _ saying _ it then.  All right?  I was — out of breath.”

“Are you sh — these are a hundred bucks each,” said the one with the ass and the eyebrows.  Someone else whistled.

“Are these  _ real?” _

“Shh!”

“Well, get yourself something nice,” Holly said.  “Music or — I don’t know.”  She suddenly felt ridiculously old, and  _ that _ was ridiculous, of  _ course _ young people still liked  _ music,  _ even if it seemed possible these idiots would blow the cards on Billy Joel’s Greatest Hits.  Were they from  _ New Jersey? _

“Um,” said Ass-and-Eyebrows, appearing to wrestle briefly with a moral compunction.  Clearly she was a good wrestler.  Her face brightened and she tucked the card into her jacket pocket.  “Thanks!  And no hard feelings.”

“Didja make it to your meeting okay?” asked Cheek-Stud.

“Yes,” said Holly curtly and looked away.  She really didn’t want to encourage them.  Oh, if only she had an exit, but they were still several stops from home.  It would almost be worth it to get off at the next station and just get a damn taxi, but they  _ knew _ where she normally got off and they would  _ know _ she was running away from them.

They exchanged glances over her head and reached some kind of hive mind decision to ignore her.  For the rest of the ride they talked about what they were going to get with their windfall, a lot of hip-hop and R&B names she only knew of at a distance.  Some of them were just planning to sell the cards on or trade them for something; it seemed she was inadvertently funding all kinds of purchases, some of questionable legality.  She stood in the middle of the cluster and felt weirdly lonely.  

The next day they were as bad as ever, though, rowdy and bawdy.  One of them wanted to show Holly the new sneakers she'd bought, which was inoffensive enough, but then Cheek-Stud wanted to show her the new bra she'd bought and just hauled her teeshirt up under her chin for the purpose.  Holly didn't know where to look; she had an urge to cover her face with her hands.  

“Cover ‘em up, Sharky, you’re scaring her,” said the one with the eyebrows, laughing.  

“My tits aren't scary,” she protested, still with them on full display in their new purple bra.  “They’re perky and fun.”  She noticed a teenage boy was staring at her agog and gave him a filthy look before yanking down her shirt.  That was some mercy, although Holly thought she would be seeing the purple bra when she closed her eyes for a while. Inside her own much more demure flesh-tone bra her nipples felt hot and tight.  “Sorry, Duchess,” said Sharky unrepentantly.  It was strange to have a name to think of her by, even if it clearly wasn't her real name unless her parents had truly weird taste.  

 

Over the next couple of weeks she got used to them.  There was no other way to put it.  They were simply a part of her day.  They delighted in embarrassing her but she was starting to feel that what had initially seemed malicious was perhaps only mischievous.  They were appallingly crass but not apparently cruel; she hadn't felt at any risk of physical  _ harm _ from them for a while now.  She still refused to talk to them or give them the reactions to their teasing that they seemed to want.  Except perhaps she  _ was _ giving the reaction they wanted because they certainly didn't stop teasing her.  

She kept up the pretence of being absorbed in her coffee and the morning news but every day now she was really surreptitiously watching and listening to them.  She was learning their names.  Sharky was a nickname for, of all things, Cherlindrea, so she'd been right about her parents having bizarre taste.  Miss Eyebrows was called Jay, which might or might not be the initial J.  There was a Ella and a Carnie and a Skinny (odd ones out, those two, a shrimp and a stringbean) and a Chip and various others that she struggled to keep straight.  Sharky and Jay were easy to remember because they seemed to be ringleaders (and if she was honest she found them the most attractive).  

_ I should not be thinking about them like this.  They're far too much younger than me, they're loud and silly and rude, I live in a very nice apartment and I don't know where they live at all.  I’m a professional and they're delinquents.  I shouldn't like them at all.  I absolutely should not have fantasies in which they pin my arms and all have their way with me in an otherwise deserted subway car.   _

She wasn't actually sure if any of them had proper jobs; she gathered that they got by on a mixture of odd jobs and what you could probably term hustling.  As often as not one of them would have a black eye or bruised knuckles.  She told herself very firmly and clearly that that was not even a little bit sexy.  One evening Sharky came in carrying an extra-large soda cup full of ice and kept loading more into her mouth; it turned out she had just had her tongue pierced and was trying to numb it.  Holly wouldn’t have known if the others hadn’t kept asking her to show it to them; she couldn’t bring herself to ask a question, even crushed up against them the way she was that evening.  And she was  _ not _ interested in Sharky’s tongue.   _ And _ Sharky was a terrible person who dropped a melting ice cube down the back of her neck to make her scream.

Another thing that was confusing about them was the fact that they seemed sort of indiscriminately promiscuous within their group; just when she thought she knew who someone’s girlfriend was she would see her sucking someone else’s face, and there never seemed to be any hurt feelings about it, and she might be back with the first one a time or two later as well.  She once spent most of a morning commute trying to discreetly watch Sharky kissing Ella in an unbelievably lascivious way, to the point that Sharky had her mouth wide open with her now-healed tongue out while Ella twiddled the metal stud in it with the tip of her own tongue — until they both glanced sideways at her, slyly, and she knew they’d known she was watching the entire time and almost died of shame then and there.

Their awareness of  _ her _ awareness meant she didn’t feel she’d have a leg to stand on if she objected or protested when they started touching her in the crush of the evening commute.  The first time could almost have passed for innocuous at first; the train swayed and she’d lost her balance, and Jay had steadied her by putting her hands on her hips.  Then she’d just kept them there.  After a minute she’d begun to move them, slowly rubbing in circles.  Every one of them was watching her and all she could do was shut her eyes and try not to think about the fact that she was being molested and enjoying it.  

_ Why do they even want to do this to me?  Is it just because they think it’s funny?  What else is in it for them, honestly? _  She’d almost staggered off the train that night and had to take a very long bath with a waterproof vibrator.  After that it happened every night, first rubbing her hips and then moving to stroke her tummy and massage her bottom, at first just one or two of them but soon as many as could reach her.  She would close her eyes and sometimes rock her hips gently against their hands.  They never actually got as far as rubbing between her legs; that would have meant pulling her skirt right up and while that was an image she couldn’t get out of her head at night she would have been terrified if they’d tried it.  Apart from the risk of public exposure and disgrace and arrest and personal and professional ruin, they would be able to see her Spanx and it was impossible to imagine anyone retaining even a vague sexual interest after that.  That was the whole catch-22 of wearing heavy-duty undergarments to make it look like you had a normal body people might like to see in person.  Anyway they were all young and fit, even where they were chubby it was firm ripe chubbiness like the flesh of a peach, they definitely didn’t need to see the love handles or the tummy bulge or all the cellulite dimples on her bottom and the backs of her thighs.

_ Why am I doing this?  And what  _ am  _ I doing?  Am I somehow having an  _ affair _ with them?  Why am I  _ letting _ them?  Do I actually  _ like _ getting teased so badly I soak through my panties and still have to finish off on my own?  Being reduced to that state in a public place, walking along the street afterwards knowing I may look all right on the outside but under my clothes I’m a leaky runny slutty mess? _

_ Um. _

_ Possibly yes. _

One Monday morning they weren’t there.  They weren’t there Monday night either.  Nothing on Tuesday morning, and she began to worry.  Nothing Tuesday night and she was trying to imagine what disaster could possibly have happened to waylay the whole pack of them; something that big would probably have been in the news.  She actually tried Googling to see if she could find any stories that might be related and came up with nothing.  By lunchtime Wednesday she knew for certain that the obvious had happened.  They’d got tired of her and moved on.  Possibly even  _ because _ she’d started responding to them more.  That couldn’t be as entertaining as when she was resisting and it might even be a little repulsive.  She shouldn’t care, it was a relief that it was over, it had been stupid and dangerous and trashy and weird, and she cried herself to sleep.

On Thursday morning she was reading the news and morosely sipping a hot caffe mocha because coffee alone couldn’t help her when the train door hissed open, someone shoved Jay in and piled in behind her.  Holly leapt to her feet as if she’d sat on a bee and demanded “Where have you  _ been?” _

Jay couldn’t exactly stop and look at her because all the rest of the horde was pouring into the car and pushing her ahead of them, but she stared at her while stumbling forward and her face lit up with laughter.  “Uh, you  _ mean _ welcome back, baby, I missed you so much.”

“I meant what I said,” Holly retorted, already regretting it, although at least this time it hadn’t been a bodily insult she’d blurted out.  

“You  _ missed _ us!” Sharky cried gleefully.  

“You  _ look forward to seeing us,”  _ Jay gloated, plunking herself down next to Holly as she resumed her seat and clutched at her dignity, which was like shutting the gate after the horse had bolted into the next state.

“Just answer the question,” Holly snapped, and tried to hide her confusion by swigging from her travel cup, which now tasted too sweet.  

“We went out of town for the weekend,” Jay said, sliding her arm around Holly’s shoulders.

“It is  _ Thursday.” _

“Well, we ran into some old friends who wanted to party.  We went to a music festival.  Come with us next time.”

Holly scoffed and kept her eyes in front and sipped her mocha.  

“Hey,” said Sharky, slinging herself into the seat on the other side of Holly.  “Were you worried about us, Duchess?”

“No, you’re all big enough and ugly enough to take care of yourselves.”

Sharky tickled Holly’s cheek with the side of her forefinger, trying to coax her to look at her.  “Aww, am I ugly?”

Holly bit the rim of her cup.  Sharky blew in her ear.

“So hey,” said Jay, throwing her further off, “what do we call you?  ‘Cuz it’s fun calling you Duchess and Uptown Girl and all that but what’s your  _ name?” _

It seemed like an absurdly personal question.  “Holly,” she said, tightly.  

“That’s such a pretty name!  Were you a Christmas baby?”

“No,” Holly mumbled, “my birthday is in July.”

“Man,  _ Holly,” _ said Sharky.  “I was thinking you’d be something classy like… I dunno, maybe Margot.”

“You can’t talk, your name is  _ Cherlindrea,”  _ Holly snapped.  

For once she’d actually startled Sharky.  “How the fuck do you know that?”

“I pay attention.”  She didn’t have long to savour being on top; just to keep her off balance Jay was tickling the rim of her ear with one fingertip.  She didn’t know how to handle them being so handsy first thing in the morning; it was hard enough to cope with in the evenings.  “Now if you’ll excuse me, I have emails to catch up on.”

They smirked at each other but they went back to their friends and joined in the usual clamour.  Holly sat staring at her inbox without understanding a single subject line, inanely happy that they were all right and they were back and they still wanted her, even though that was its own set of problems.

 

Now they called her Holly every chance they got, cheerfully yelling it when they greeted her in the morning, whispering it to her while they felt her up on the evening train.  She was starting to feel strangely safe hemmed in by them, as if she was inside a sturdy wall.  No one was going to see her while she enjoyed this, even though they were getting bolder.  Early on they had kept their hands below the waist where it was harder for anyone outside the circle to see what was going on; now they would stroke and squeeze her breasts, quickly and furtively, sliding their hands under her jacket to fumble through her blouse and her bra.  They talked to her more while they touched her, though it was just muffled snatches; “God, you’re hot, Holly,” “Hold still, Holly,” “Does this feel good, Holly?”

_ You’re hot, Holly. _  Did they honestly mean that?  Her, the way she was?  There just didn’t seem to be that much reason to keep going if they didn’t.  She couldn’t be that funny any more.

She knew what she  _ wanted _ to do, she  _ thought _ they’d like it, but it still took some time for her to build up her nerve, to choose the right thing, buy it, then decide what day she was actually going to try it.  She chose a Friday because nothing really mattered at the end of the day on Friday and if she failed abjectly she would have the weekend to recover from it.  She spent the day itself normally, working hard, although she was acutely conscious of what she was planning and felt as if it must  _ show _ somehow.  The girls didn’t guess at all in the morning, and of course nobody she worked with would have had a clue.  At the end of the day she hurried to the executive restroom and locked herself in to change.  

She needed the privacy to wriggle out of the Spanx; they came off easier than they went on but there was always a certain amount of puffing.  Her skirt was much tighter without them and there were horizontal creases over her lower belly and at hip level where the fabric  was pulled tight horizontally and crept up vertically.  She had to turn around and bend in front of the long mirror a few times to assure herself that there was nothing showing through, no outline of lace or elastic to give her away.  She felt half-naked like this; her bare inner thighs kept brushing together.

_ No one’s going to notice, so your skirt doesn’t look as neat as usual, don’t think about it, you’re doing it now.   _ She hurried down to the subway with her heart pounding.  The train was packed and it took a little longer than usual for them to draw in around her, which put her through an agony of impatience.  Finally they were there, pressed in close, and Jay was murmuring in her ear, “Hi baby, how was your day?” while Sharky smoothed her hands down over her hips.  She felt something was different almost at once and paused, gripping thoughtfully.  Holly closed her eyes tight and bit her lip.

_ Oh God oh God please let her like this, please don’t let her be put off by how fat I am, God knows  _ her  _ ass is huge, but that’s different, that’s…   _ Sharky was groping eagerly all over her hips, her bottom, the tops of her thighs, and now so was Jay, and so were assorted other hands.

“Holy shit, Holly, what’re you wearing?” Sharky asked with a suppressed giggle.  

“You finally got rid of the fucking control-top pantyhose,” Jay breathed.  “Is this —”  She slid her fingers under one elastic strap, through the fabric of the skirt, and snapped it against Holly’s thigh.  “Garter belt and stockings, you little devil.”

“Holly,” Sharky said, her voice more urgent now, “I’m gonna unzip your skirt, okay?  Just hold still.  Guys, don’t let anyone in, this is Holly’s magic circle, okay?”  There were murmurs of agreement and Holly felt Sharky pull down the zip at the back of her waist, loosening the fabric over her hips, and slide her hands inside.  Jay did the same in the front, which made everything kind of tight again, and she felt a jolt of alarm that a seam would rip, but they were stroking her through the silk and lace and down to her bare thighs, breathing fast and hard against her neck.

_ I’m letting them take my clothes off in public.  If we get caught I’m going to die.   _ Jay’s fingertips were nudging between her thighs, pressing on her mound through her new silk briefs, circling and making her whimper.  And there were Sharky’s fingers too, entering from behind, feeling where the silk was wet and squishy, sliding against her lips on a layer of slick, and nudging the fabric out of the way altogether to stroke them.   _ I’m having sex in public I’m having sex in public I’m going to get fired so hard I go to jail automatically.   _ Between them, in a shockingly short time, they worked her up to orgasm and she came with her face buried in the shoulder of Jay’s satin bomber jacket, cheap polyester satin that only made her face sweat more.  The advantage of being firmly wedged between three or four big strong young women was that when you had just come so hard your legs felt like jelly, they held you up.  

They put her back together, tucking in her blouse and zipping up her skirt, and she managed to dig in her handbag and find a purse pack of tissues to blot her face with.  She didn’t want to do anything about the slippery mess in her undies, she wanted to revel in that.  Sharky leaned over her shoulder and very deliberately sucked her fingers clean. 

“You needed  _ that,” _ she said, and grinned, the jewel in her cheek glinting.

“We’re nearly at your stop,” Jay said.  “You gonna be okay or do you want us to walk you home?”

“I’m okay, thank you.”  She felt rosy and glowing and very much inclined to giggle, although there was still a little uptight voice at the back of her head saying that it was  _ not _ a good idea to let them know where she lived.  “Oh, thank you!”  The giggle bubbled out and she bit her lip; they all laughed and at least for now she didn’t feel they were laughing  _ at _ her.

“Holly,” said Jay, “can we  _ please _ have your number?  Pretty please with sugar on top?”  She looked so  _ eager  _ it was a little bewildering, but honestly flattering, and the little uptight voice was at least for the moment neutral on phone numbers.  Holly fumbled in her jacket pocket, found her card case and took one out for Jay.  Should she give them each one?  No, that was just silly, a business card could be passed around.   _ (Like I want to be passed around.) _

“Ooh,  _ businesslike,”  _ said Jay, looking the card over with a smile. 

“Don’t  _ ever _ call me at work,” Holly said hastily.  “Between eight and six — no, actually, always text first and I’ll tell you if it’s a good time to call.  All right?”

“Okay, no problem.  We text more anyway.”

The train was rattling into the station; Holly was going to have to get out and try to look normal.  “Do I look all right?” she asked.  “I haven’t rubbed all my make-up off, have I?”

“You look fine,” Jay assured her.  “Your lipstick’s still on and everything.”

That gave her an idea that she  _ hoped _ wasn’t stupid; Jay was still holding the card up between them and she bobbed her head forward and kissed the white back of it, leaving a print of her lips.  It looked uneven when she saw it but she’d done it now and the train had just stopped and they made sure she had her briefcase and helped her through the crowd and out.  

She’d never looked  _ back _ when leaving the train before; this time she did and found they were all pressed up to the window.  She gave them a small, hesitant wave and they exploded into grins and waves and blown kisses.  Sharky huffed mist on the window and drew a heart in it.  That was so sweet she almost couldn’t believe it.  She was still feeling wobbly and unco-ordinated, her reactions slow, but she managed to get herself together to blow them a kiss just before the train pulled out.  She wobbled her way to the stairs and up.  

She’d hoped they might  _ like _ the lingerie, but what a reaction!  She was still a little bit stunned by it.  One of those warm breezes that sometimes came up from the subway found its way up her skirt at the top of the stairs and made her shiver as it kissed the tops of her thighs and reminded her how lavishly wet her underwear was.  Just the consciousness of that and of what she was wearing kept her feeling tingly all the way to her building.  

_ These people don’t know what I just did.  They don’t know that well-dressed woman with her Armani jacket and her diamond studs just had sex on the fucking  _ subway _ with two gorgeous girls while ten others watched them.  If they notice me at all they might think I’m a bit pudgy and my skirt needs pressing; they have no  _ idea _ I’m wearing all this lovely silk and lace and my panties are just  _ saturated.  

By the time she was in the elevator the rush was wearing off a bit and she was uncomfortably aware that some people, if they knew that, would think it was disgusting; that she was unattractive and desperate and it was pathetic for her to be feeling sexy and daring because she’d done something so sordid.  A middle-aged frump thinking she was some kind of sex bomb just because she put on Agent Provocateur — which she’d ordered online, for heaven’s sake, because she was too embarrassed to go into a shop to try it on.  Did trying something like this have to mean her emotions were so  _ raw?   _ It wasn’t fair; couldn’t she just hold on to feeling happy for the rest of the evening?

Her phone chimed in her pocket.  The way she was feeling, she assumed it would be work, and probably that she was in trouble for forgetting something too.  She sighed, took it out and thumbed the button.  A text from an unknown number.  A string of emojis, hearts and water drops and stars and — were those peaches?  She was blinking at them when it chimed again, another unknown number; “U R SOFA KING HOT.”  Was that autocorrect gone wrong or a joke?  Another chime, unknown number, “my fingers still smell like pussy.”  As she walked to her door the chime just kept sounding, the texts piling in, “LUV U HOLLY,” “I smelled her fingers it true,” “pics pls I wanna see what I felt,” “was that real r u real,” “WE’RE DOING THAT AGAIN RIGHT,” “<3<3<3,” “PIX PLZZZZZZZ,” “r u still wet bc im still wet,” “not to be super gay about it but your beautiful girl,” “cant stop thinking about it omg,” “THAT WAS AWESOME GOD I’M GLAD WE PICKED ON YOU.”

She closed the door of her apartment and leaned on it, staring at the phone screen with a little disbelieving smile playing about her lips.  First things first.  She started texting back, “Thank you!  What name should I put in my contacts for you?”  Then she put down the phone and made herself take care of things sensibly before she looked at it again, although she could hear it chiming the whole time she was hanging up her coat and washing her hands (because oh, they were sweaty) and pouring herself a glass of wine.  With that in hand to fortify her, she sat down on the couch, took off her shoes and tucked her feet up under her, and started updating her contacts.  They were sending her pictures of themselves too, beaming and poking their tongues out and making kissy faces and exaggerated snarls; they made her laugh as she matched them to their names and numbers.  Why did it make her feel so warm just to see messages coming in with their names on them?

They kept on asking her for pictures in return; enthusiasm for her lingerie was clearly running high.  It seemed risky but on the second glass of wine — she had taken the first one rather fast — she decided to do it.  She had to check her make-up first and redo most of it; it would probably have been unkind for Jay to tell her the truth about how she looked when she asked on the train but the fact was her nose and chin and forehead were shiny and her eyeshadow had disappeared over the course of the day somehow.  She undressed to her underwear and then realised her bra didn’t match; she’d been so focused on the suspenders and panties that she’d forgotten to order one (she damn sure would now) and the one she had on was emphatically not sexy.  After briefly scrapping the entire idea she realised she could take it off and sort of cover and cradle her breasts with one arm.  

She stood in front of her full length mirror and tried not to look as nervous as she felt and took a picture.  Looking at it on the screen she realised that her unmade bed showed in the background, so she deleted it and made the bed and then thought that the vase of lilies from the living room coffee table would look nice on her nightstand; after about half an hour’s anxious set-dressing she felt ready to try again and the good part about this delay, she realised, was that the bra strap marks on her shoulders had faded.  The next photo had to be discarded because her feet looked flat and her ankles looked thick when she didn’t have her shoes on, and then the shoes she’d had on today looked weird without the suit they went so well with so she had to choose another pair, and then the photo was  _ almost _ good except she’d lowered her head trying to see the phone screen and the mirror at the same time and gave herself a double chin.  How could one person have so many bad angles?  She had to remember to hold her tummy in and turn her hips and put one foot in front of the other so her legs didn’t look like one big leg and honestly it was no wonder Kim Kardashian didn’t have a real job, this was  _ time-consuming. _

Finally, at long last, she had one that was presentable, didn’t make it look like she lived in a sty, and even showed her hair looking quite nice.  She sat on the bed and took her nerve in both hands and sent it out to the whole pack of them.  

There was an agonising pause and then  _ feedback _ happened.  

“HOLY SHIT WORTH THE WAIT”

“IM GAY”

“dan holly ur bobbie s” (what?)

“so so so hot”

“dont take ths the wrong way but i never ever thought youd be like this i thought you were just uptight and bitchy and THIS IS THE BEST WAY TO BE WRONG EVER,” followed by a string of hearts and flowers.

“IM SUPER GAY”

“i wanna lick grape jelly off your belly”

“i am screamin”

“this bitch screamin”

“destroy me”

“whats a proper respectful way to ask a classy businesslady to sit on your face”

“more plzzzzzzzzzz”

“your comforter looks rly nice I like the diamond pattern”

“also I wanna fuck you on it”

“we r sitin in fuken puddles”

“can we have another 1 with your hair down”

They kept prompting her and coaxing her and the responses were so flattering that she did take one with her hair down, then one sitting on her bed, then lying on her bed (that was a good angle, it flattened her tummy right out), then with her breasts uncovered (but the same angle that flattered her tummy made  _ them _ try to slide under her arms so she had to move), then with her legs spread so they could see how soaked the silk was there.  She was riding on a wave of approval when she took that one, but after that had to go to the bathroom, and when she came back and looked at it again she felt dismayed.  It was messy and there were wisps of pubic hair escaping on either side of the crotch of the panties because she hadn’t trimmed anything in far too long and she was getting led into showing so much more than she’d intended, like a cautionary tale about a naïve teenage girl.

_ And what if they were laughing at her?   _ Tone was hard to judge in texts and emails and she’d got it badly wrong a few times in the past.  What if all that praise was sarcastic and they were crying laughing over her stupid pictures?   _ What if they shared them with other people?   _ It seemed like a remote possibility, she couldn’t imagine anyone she worked with overlapping with them in social media, but sometimes strange things happened and oh God, what if these got back to someone important?  She felt sick.  Why hadn’t she  _ thought _ of these things sooner?

The phone chimed; it was Jay.  “Can I call you? <3”

_ No.  I should stop now.  I should draw a line somewhere.   _ But that was so damn hard to do.  She typed in “Yes.”

She lay on her side with her knees curled up waiting for it to ring.  Why was it taking so long?  Was Jay setting up speakerphone and warning the others to keep quiet so they could all listen in and have a good laugh at her?  Or was she finding somewhere quiet to make the call?  Finally it rang and she answered, the phone slipping in her sweating hand.  

“Hello?”

“Hi,” said Jay.  Her voice was warm and low and somehow she sounded as if she was in a small space; something about the echoes.  It seemed intimate.   _ She could just be in a toilet stall,  _ Holly chided herself.  “I just… I wanted to talk to you before I go to sleep.”

“Are you in bed?” Holly asked, surprised.  It seemed far too early for someone like Jay to be turning in, but she supposed taking the photos had taken her a long time.  

“Well, I know  _ you _ are.  Yeah, I’m in bed.  Wanna hear what I’m wearing?”

“Oh, I didn’t mean, um…”

“Teeshirt and undies.  Not as fancy as you but just as wet’n’sweaty.”  There was a pause; Holly couldn’t think of anything to say and she felt she was breathing too loudly.  “It feels like things just started happening really fast,” Jay went on, “and I’m into it but I just wanna make really sure you are too.”

“I’m nervous,” Holly admitted, “but if you mean it, if you really…”  She paused and took a deep breath, trying to find the strong assertive Holly that had to still be there somewhere.  “If you’re just playing with me I will make you  _ very _ sorry.”

“Holly.  Chill.  We’re not playing, we like you.  A  _ lot. _  This is — this is so not what we normally do!”  She started to laugh.  “I mean fuck, you’re probably thinking what am I doing, I’m this fancy rich business lady who’s probably a lawyer or something and I’m fucking around with these  _ hoodlums,  _ right?  It’s exactly as crazy from our side.  I’ve never ever been with someone like you.  We thought we were just messing with some snobby lady and it like  _ mutated.   _ But I thought, you know, there’s a dozen of us and only one of you so you could be feeling a little outnumbered and freaked out.”

“I’m fine,” Holly insisted.  “And I’m not a lawyer.  I work in advertising, we’re a boutique agency serving some very exclusive high-end clients.”

“Wow, like… Nike or something?”

“More like Louboutin.”  She hesitated.  “That’s a French luxury shoe and bag designer.”

“I know, duh,” Jay said.  “They’re the ones with the red soles that look like murder to wear, right?”

“They’re actually more comfortable than you’d think.  And they do make flats too.  Even sneakers.”   _ What am I telling her that for?  Do I think she’s going to say oh I didn’t realise that and head out and buy a pair of Louboutin sneakers with her non-existent money?   _ “Well, anyway, that’s what I do,” she said, “and honestly it’s quite stressful and demanding and — and I need something completely different to help me relax.”

“I see,” Jay said.  “Hmm.  Are you feeling relaxed now?”

“Not very,” Holly admitted.  “More excited and keyed up.”

“Well, it looked like you were getting all revved up taking sexy pictures for us.  You done anything about that yet?”

“No.”

“Hmm.”  A soft sigh; it sounded as though Jay breathed out deeply as she turned over in bed.  “Do you wanna?”

“Now?  With you?”

“I just keep remembering how soft and wet you felt.”  Her voice softened again and turned a little husky.  “Do you like to touch yourself on top of your undies for a while first?  ‘Cuz that’s what I’m gonna do.”

_ I’ve never done phone sex in my life, I’m going to be awful. _  “Usually.”

“Mmm… I’m glad you like that too.”

If she was awful, Jay didn’t tell her so, just kept coaxing and prompting her to describe what she was doing, how it felt, to the point where she couldn’t describe anything because she was just moaning at the phone pressed between the pillow and her cheek, straining frantically towards an orgasm that lifted her hips six inches off the bed and dropped her with a crash.  She lay there gasping and panting and  _ thrilled _ while she listened to Jay coming and calling her name as sweetly as could be.

“Oh God,” Jay groaned.  “Did  _ that _ relax ya?”

“Oh,  _ yes.” _  There was a brief exchange of out-of-breath giggles.  

“Hey Holly?”

“Yes?”

“You’re always beautiful but you’re the most beautiful when you come.”

“Oh my goodness.”

“Yeah your goodness.  All kinds of juicy goodness.  I’d tell you all about it but I’m pooped.  Sweet dreams, Holly.”  

“Good night.”

A soft kiss sound and then the call was over.  Holly lay back, thinking that she would just catch her breath and then have a shower and go to bed properly, and thought that until she fell asleep.

 


	2. Chapter 2

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I FINALLY MANAGED TO WRITE ANOTHER CHAPTER. This one was a long time brewing by my standards and I kept forgetting that people hadn't read the early parts of it. I hope it's still enjoyable!

By Monday Holly had taken so many selfies she was pretty sure she counted as an honorary millennial.  She’d always rejected the idea that she was Generation X; it sounded unsuccessful and shabby.  It was people who’d spent the 90s wearing flannel and getting piercings and being flaky and useless, not working hard and  _ achieving  _ the way she had.  She’d expected that making the sacrifice  _ then _ would have led to more  _ now,  _ and she also didn’t like feeling like the stereotype of a career woman who was doing well professionally but had no personal life.

So now apparently she had a personal life that consisted of sending embarrassing pictures of herself to actual millennials.  They hadn’t stopped texting her all weekend.  She’d been woken late on Saturday morning when she finally drifted up from the depths of sleep enough for the phone’s repeated chiming to reach her.  She blinked at it blearily; she felt almost hung over.  She couldn’t face it yet, so she rolled out of bed and shuffled to the bathroom and found she had to actually peel off her panties; all that wetness which had felt as slippery as egg white at the time had dried like egg white too.  Her face looked awful in the mirror, with panda eyes from sleeping in her make-up.  She covered it with Take the Day Off balm and got into the shower to rinse it off.  

The shower helped; it usually did.  She used the massage showerhead on her neck and shoulders until they felt pleasantly loose and warm and then brought it between her legs to pulse as she remembered the train last night.   _ I really did that.  Oh my lord, I really did that.  And got away with it.  Apparently.  Oh God, what if we’re on security footage?  For fuck’s sake, Holly, there are worse things than that on subway security footage every night.   _ She bit her lip as the pleasure intensified; she was actually a little sore.  She’d been so excited with Jay that she might have gone overboard in that way you did when nothing would hurt until after you’d calmed down.  

_ I wonder if she feels sore?  I wonder if she feels a little twinge in her pussy this morning and thinks about me?  Oh my God, I wonder if she’s masturbating right now too?   _ The thought of it, the thought of the gorgeous little breathy sounds Jay had made over the phone, pushed her up and over and she had to brace herself against the slate wall of the shower as she came.  She sank down to sit leaning in the corner, shuddering with relief and pleasure.   _ Most beautiful when you come.  It would be nice to think so.  She didn’t really see my face then, did she?  So she was probably just being sweet.  Complimenting me.  I’m lucky she wants to do that. _

She wrapped her hair and her body in clean towels and went back to sit on the bed; she was going to want to wash the comforter too, she realised.  She’d made a wet patch that was still faintly visible; usually that only happened to the bottom sheet.  She took a deep breath and a look at her phone.

Sharky:  _ Damn girl, what’d you do to Jay?  heard her through the wall _

Jay: _ xxxoooxxxooo _

Carnie:  _ do it to me too  _

Ella:  _ hey Im lookin back through all ur pics n just have to say UR A QUEEN _

Ella:  _ thats a promotion from duchess lol _

They went on like that, silly and flirty and warm, and they were sending her more pictures of themselves too, including one of Sharky and Ella that made her stare and blush for a long time, both of them topless, hugging with their breasts pressed together, looking up at the phone Sharky was holding above their heads and flirting shamelessly with the camera.  Sharky was making her favourite kissy-face and Ella was winking while her tongue curled up from the corner of her mouth; she looked like a cat licking its chops.  They were in a bathroom with mould in the grout between the tiles; Holly tried not to pay too much attention to that.  

  
(illustration by [sexy-crustacean](http://sexy-crustacean.tumblr.com/post/160138733666))

It was followed by a photo she stared at even longer, Ella sucking Sharky’s nipple as she squeezed the other breast — still with her head tilted and her eye turned to the side to twinkle at Holly — while Sharky’s head tipped back and her eyes closed and her expression melted into a blissful smile, her full lower lip caught under her teeth.  They were such _ show-offs. _

And their hair was wet and there were drops of water on their skin and not even a touch of make-up on their faces.  They’d got straight out of the shower and decided to show themselves to her just the way they were.  It made her resent them at the same time as she wanted them, with the queasy guilty hate she tended to feel for really confident, attractive people who were   
__  
nice  
  
as well; they could at least have the decency to despise her so that things made sense.   Could she   
__  
try  
  
to reciprocate?

She tried lifting the phone above her head and taking a picture of herself.  No, hold on, her hair was still in the towel, she looked bald.  She pulled it off and finger-combed her hair and tried again.  Not so bad.  Her face was freshly washed so it wasn’t shiny and she had a bit of colour in her cheeks and lips.  She gave her towel-wrapped cleavage some careful consideration and rearrangement, just moving the edge of the towel lower and boosting her breasts a bit more with her arm under them.  She still didn’t think she could send it.  The more she looked at it the more washed-out and in need of corrective Photoshop she looked, particularly under the eyes.  She put the phone aside and went to get dressed.  

She spent the day restlessly cycling between the girls’ texts and her laptop, ordering lingerie, looking at pictures, trying to work out what to  _ do _ to appeal to them, except if she changed what she was doing would she cease to appeal?  They seemed so confident about talking to  _ her _ and asking her all about herself but every exchange made her nervous that she would screw it up somehow.  

_ what music do u like? _

_ I like Adele.   _ That was true and at least bound to be someone they’d heard of.  If she said Dusty Springfield either they wouldn’t know who that was or if they did it would make her seem even older than she was.  Skinny sent her a video of Adele rapping a verse of a Nicki Minaj song which… was probably meant to find common ground?  

_ we’re hitting the clubs tonite you wana come? _

_ Sorry, I already have plans.   _ That was a complete and total lie born of abject cowardice.  She couldn’t imagine going into a club with those girls.  What would she even wear?  The closest thing to anything appropriate she had was a black silk cocktail dress.  She wouldn’t be able to dance, she would be horribly self-conscious, she would embarrass them, she would hate every second.  Her “plans” would amount to watching nature documentaries on Netflix (hearing David Attenborough talk was always soothing) and drinking pinot gris.  

_ okay next time! _

_ we’re gona get you out there tho _

_ yeah ur with us now _

_ u need to have some fucken fun _

_ oh but hey doesnt have to be all club type fun like we chill too! _

That felt like a feed line for a Netflix joke but what if people didn’t even  _ make _ those jokes any more?  At Holly’s end of the advertising market attempts to harvest the power of meme humour weren’t really an issue, but she kept up with overall industry trends and knew that they were an extremely hard thing to get right because they were both ephemeral and unpredictable.  Very little earned more scorn from young people than the tone-deaf or outdated use of a meme joke; there had been howls of mirth when some advertisers hadn’t understood “Netflix and chill” was a euphemism.  Holly thought a rule of thumb could probably be that if she’d heard of it, it was old by then.

_ Good,  _ she eventually replied,  _ I’m more of a chill person. _

_ Holly you have exactly zero chill _

_ we can teach you a thing or two _

_ learn from the experts _

_ one time i chilled so hard they checked for a pulse _

_ u got Netflix lol _

So she could have said it after all; she mentally kicked herself.  But maybe it was for the best; “Netflix and chill” was an implicit invitation for an at-home date and she couldn’t imagine what her neighbours would think of guests like them.  Well, no, she could; they’d probably call the police. 

_ u wana relax right?   _ A winking emoji.

_ this is what we’re here for! _

_ ur seriously gona have such a good time _

_ deep relaxation for Holly _

_ like a day spa  _

_ but fucking _

_ butt fucking too if you want _

_ I volunteer to stick something up Holly’s butt _

_ You wouldn’t be the first.   _ Admittedly only she had done it for herself, but she was still  _ someone. _

_ GO HOLLY _

_ OMG _

_ dirty girl _

_ frrrrreak _

_ so playin with your ass next time _

A string of peach emojis.  Holly grinned, and covered her mouth with her hand, and asked herself why she was doing that when she was alone.

_ u have such a great ass, so soft n thicc _

_ pic plz _

_ yeah I need a new wallpaper _

Attention and approval went to her head again and resulted in another series of pictures; taking photos over her own shoulder in the mirror made the whole thing even more complicated and she had to change her entire outfit because sweatpants were  _ sweatpants _ even if they were designer.  It didn’t seem to matter that her underwear today was plain nude; they were just a layer that came off in the second picture.  She wasn’t  _ quite _ ready to spread her cheeks for them and rather than pull her pants  _ right _ down she sort of arranged them artfully to conceal the underside where the cellulite started, but even with those worries she was excited, flushed with tingly warmth.  And the  _ reactions!   _ Probably her favourite for its simple eloquence was the photo of Jay’s pussy, lips spread with her fingers and glistening wet.  She rolled on the bed on her back clutching the phone to her chest, knowing what a fool she was being but giddy just the same.

(Besides that she was surprised by the thick crop of curly dark hair; she supposed she’d taken it for granted that any hair on Jay’s body would be as groomed as her eyebrows.  So her own hair didn’t matter?  Things kept not  _ mattering. _ )

In the afternoon she tried to resume a little normality, running weekend errands, but her phone kept chiming and she had that thrilling secret feeling; she was choosing avocados in a normal, non-deviant way and looked as if she was just checking her shopping list on her phone, while reading filthy messages from her… what could she call them?  Admirers?  Fuckbuddies?  Either way, people who texted her to say her ass looked delicious.  And besides that, they kept being so  _ friendly _ to her, seeming to want to include her in their day, so in between ass compliments she was kept informed that Carnie saw a cute dog, Ella had picked up some work helping at a bar for the next couple of weeks and Chip had won a bet with someone that meant their first round of drinks tonight would be free.  

The evening went more or less as she’d expected, except the continuing string of texts and photos of their night out, laughing, dancing, drinking, sweating, flashing the camera and making lewd gestures.  She still had such mixed feelings; she was angry with  _ them _ for being what she’d never been and had left it too late to become.  She was angry with herself for feeling that way about people who were just enjoying life and wanted to share their enjoyment with her.  It was, frankly, bitchy.

For most of Sunday they seemed to be dormant; sleeping it off, she supposed.  She went for a long walk through the park; she treated herself to a mani-pedi; she did her make-up with some care and tried taking a series of bubble-bath pictures they might like to wake up to.  She was reading  _ Marie Claire _ on the bed in her bathrobe when the phone went crazy and she grabbed it up.

_ bubble boobs!!!!!!!!!! _

_ Holly u r an actual gift  _

_ dang your tub is huge _

_ this is like the exact middle between sexy and cute _

_ clean girl!  I like her too _

_ the one half out of the water with all the suds btwn ur legs is my fave _

_ like a couple of us could get in there wtih u _

_ its not that big _

_ me and Skinny could and thats all that matters _

_ u still in the tub? _

_ No,  _ she answered,  _ I got out a little while ago, but I’m not dressed yet. _

_ OH OH OH _

_ SHOW SHOW SHOW _

_ It’s just a bathrobe, my dear.   _ She quickly pulled the front apart a little further over her breasts and raised one knee to show some leg before taking a picture; it was getting easier to do without extensive planning.  On impulse she kissed the air, hoping Sharky would like that.

_ U R BEAUTIFUL _

_ cmon u tease tities out _

_ omg rude _

_ titties out please Miss Holly _

That simple request somehow led to a very long guided masturbation session with intermittent photography, all of them egging her on gleefully until she was exhausted.  

_ I’m sorry, I loved that but I just can’t do any more.  My hands are shaking. _

_ bet ur fingers r pruney _

_ clean girl is gone _

_ you did so good Holly we’re proud of you! _

_ shit Im impressed u went that long, I had to take breaks _

_ man i wish we cd be there to wipe u down _

_ okay I have to mom friend u a little don’t fall asleep like that!  cover up so u don’t catch a cold!   _

_ it’s like 6 who goes to sleep at 6 _

_ wll she can nap, anyway she got work tmr  _

_ tht u were going 2 say its a school night _

_ dont make it weird _

_ proud of you Holly xxx _

_ sleep well bby u deserve it _

 

Life took on a slightly new shape now.  Even after switching to evening feel-ups there had still been a sense in the mornings that Holly was separate from the group of younger women; there was still a line between them even if it was a dotted one that the girls clearly felt free to cross whenever they felt like it.  Now it seemed as if they didn't see any line any more.  They just piled in around her and hugged her and whispered dirty jokes in her ear and showed her things on their phones almost as if she were one of them.  She didn't know exactly how to reciprocate; she hugged back, awkwardly, she reacted with startled, smothered laughter, she looked and tried to see what they liked.  They'd decided because of her job that she must be an expert on fashion and luxury goods and hopefully asked her if she could hook them up with a discount on a Coach purse or something, and what she thought of this Zac Posen dress Rihanna was wearing.

She didn’t get anything so direct as discounts but she certainly did get gifts through work, costly little goodies dished out in the name of relationship building, goodwill, knowing the product.  Sometimes there were tickets for shows and events; she didn’t have anyone to take to those so unless it was a function she was expected to attend to represent the company she would give them to higher-ups’ PAs, because that couldn’t hurt and she didn’t like waste.  She didn’t even take everything home the way she had when this was new to her and exciting.  There was a cabinet under a bookshelf in her office where she had been stashing things vaguely meaning to do something with them one day.  The people she might have given them to had just sort of fallen away year after year.

She knelt in front of it frowning at the contents before picking out some small bottles of perfume; she’d grown to like the girls’ cheap-and-cheerful drugstore fragrances just by association, they were what she could smell when they crowded around her in a “magic circle,” but some more sophisticated scents would be interesting.  She couldn’t offer them on the train home, there was no room in the crowd to open her briefcase and anyway she would have looked ridiculous, like an Avon lady or something.  Besides, this was the night they decided to surprise her with a bullet vibe hidden up Chip’s sleeve and she couldn’t think about anything else; it was a cheap plasticky little thing without much power to it but the combination of the buzzing sensation, the fact that they’d decided to  _ do _ this and the constant thrilling fear that someone would notice the buzzing  _ sound _ over the general subway racket just about demolished her.  She was torn between wanting to share her Lelo collection and embarrassment at just how extensive it was.

The next morning she offered them the perfumes and there were actual squeals of glee; they all sprayed and sniffed each other until the air was a fog of mixed scents and one poor man who was looking rather green had to move to a different car.

“Which ones do you wear?” Jay asked.

“Oh, none of these, lately I’ve been wearing L’Eau D’Issey and sometimes Flower by Kenzo.”

“Oh?”  Jay leaned in close till her nose and lips almost brushed Holly’s neck, just inside the crisp collar of her shirt, and sniffed.  “What’s this?”

“Th-that’s Flower.”

“That’s Holly,” said Jay, and softly licked the side of her neck, making her shiver all over and briefly question whether she should even go to work today.

At first she did just bring them leftover work gifts, but there were only so many of those that she thought they’d like and by the next week she’d started popping out in her lunch hour to buy them little things as she learned more about what they liked; colours for their lips and nails, powders and lotions with their favourite scents that they promised to put on when they got out of the shower, or before bed, and to think of her.  

_ You’re not trying to buy their love, I hope, _ said a small sharp voice from the base of her mind.

_ I don’t know why else they’d keep putting up with me,  _ said another, sharper.

 

_ hey Holly  _

_ Saturday night girl u shd be with us _

_ or we shud be w u _

_ where u live neway _

_ UPTOWN shes Uptown Girl _

_ well duh upper E side we know were she gets off _

_ we know how she gets off too BUT WE DONT STALK U HOME HOLLY _

_ cmon Holly pls we wanna be w u <3 _

Holly sat on her couch with one foot tucked under her, wineglass in one hand, phone in the other, gnawing her lip.  It was late.  The building was quiet.  The soundproofing in the walls and ceilings was excellent; this was a building of people who had top-of-the-line stereo systems and didn’t want someone else’s symphony bleeding through their jazz fusion.  She could buzz them up and it would all be discreet and simple.  She wanted to have all of them around her without the restraint of being in public so badly her body ached.  

_ Give me half an hour to tidy the place up,  _ she tapped in quickly before she could lose her nerve.  The maid had been yesterday so that was a generous estimate; there was no mess to speak of.  She took a deep breath and added her address.

_ FUCK YEAH _

_ u dont need to we wana see u not ur kitchen _

_ it cd take that long to get there tho _

_ i cant wait _

_ wait 4 me meet u guys at Dels _

_ on way!!!! _

Holly put the phone down and knocked back her drink.  She looked at herself in yoga pants and baggy sweater and scrambled off the couch, rushing to the bedroom.  Strip  _ off,  _ new French knickers, garter belt, silk stockings, careful careful no snags, where was the matching bra, oh God sweating, oh God should have had shower  _ first,  _ no time, all off, hussy’s bath with a washcloth, all back  _ on,  _ perfume, touch up make-up, brush hair, clothes!  What clothes?  No clothes?  Silk kimono?  Didn’t match, would they care?  Shoes?  No, slippers, the nice suede mules.  Get all that crap off the bed, magazines, iPad —

She stopped, looking at the iPad in her hands, and really hated herself for it, but knew what she was going to do.  She gathered up her best jewellery and took the credit cards out of her wallet and put them in the wardrobe safe with her passport and other important papers.  She considered stashing the whole wallet but no, they might show up hungry and she wasn’t sure she had food for a dozen people and if they ordered in she’d have to try to hide from them that she was getting her wallet from the safe and that was just setting a trap for herself.  She put the iPad and MacBook on the top shelf of the wardrobe under a stack of folded sweaters and made sure no metallic edge showed.  It just didn’t make sense to leave temptation in their way, she told herself firmly.  And she would look stupid answering the door in her lingerie so she put on a cream silk scoop-neck top and a black cashmere skirt and the suede mules and tried to pretend this was what she would wear to relax at home.  At least the skirt was a stretchy knit, Donna Karan, you could conceivably relax in that, it wasn’t as formal and structured as the suits she wore for work.

How long did she have left?  Maybe ten minutes?  She brushed her teeth and redid her lipstick and undid the good of the brushing by striding back to the kitchen and knocking back half a glass more of the pinot gris.  She remembered the yoga pants and sweater and ordinary unsexy underwear were still in a puddle on the bedroom floor and rushed back to stuff them in the laundry hamper.  Her heart was almost humming in her chest.  She was as nervous as she’d ever been but so excited she couldn’t keep still.  When the intercom sounded she jumped half out of her skin.

“Yes?”

“Holly!  We made it.”  It sounded like Sharky.  “Damn, this place is nice!  You better let us in before we lower the values.”  

“Yes, come straight up.”  She look one last look around at the living room and realised how dull and quiet it seemed.  She hadn’t even had any music on.  It wasn’t going to be dull or quiet for long.  A few moments later she heard an exuberant drumroll of a knock and rushed to open the door.   _ Get in get in quickly, let me just close the door behind you and enjoy having you here without worrying about anyone else noticing. _

The first one in was Jay and she blocked the others in their tracks by throwing her arms around Holly and kissing her in greeting.  It took Holly’s breath away; they’d kissed her cheeks and her neck and her ears in the magic circle but no one had kissed her mouth and now that it came she was overwhelmed by the thought of how incredibly, anciently long it had been since she was properly kissed.  She wrapped her arms around Jay’s neck and clung to her, lost in the suck and the surge of the kiss, heat spiking down into her middle.  Someone else shoved Jay from behind and she shuffled forward, Holly shuffling back, not wanting to break contact for anything as the others poured in through the foyer on either side of them and the door banged shut at last.  

Jay’s hands slid down her back and over and under her bottom, squeezing and lifting; Holly caught her breath again as Jay grabbed handfuls of the skirt over her thighs and quickly hauled the hem up to hip-height, then slipped her hands under her bottom again and hoisted her up to cling to her with her legs wrapped around her waist.   _ My God, she’s strong,  _ Holly thought; she’d been taking it for granted since late childhood that no one was going to lift her up like that.  She felt as if she should get down, should point out in all fairness that Jay had probably bitten off more than she could chew, but Jay was still kissing her eagerly.

At last Jay pulled back; Holly was dismayed to realise a strand of spit had stretched between their lips and broke against her chin, but Jay just grinned up at her.  “That was so having us over is  _ instantly _ rewarding,” she said.

“She talked about how she was gonna lay one on ya as soon as we saw you the whole way over here,” said Carnie, who was bouncing her butt on the larger couch to test it.  

“It’s — it’s appreciated,” Holly said, trying to slide to the floor with a modicum of dignity, although her skirt got hooked up on Jay’s belt buckle so the modicum was minimum.  The girls were fanning out through the apartment as if they were at an open home, examining everything with frank, cheerful interest.  There was already someone rummaging in the fridge, Chip was putting her phone in the stereo dock and cuing up music and Holly could hear the shower running and Skinny yelling “Holy fuck Holly, your water pressure!”  Carnie bounded down from the couch and ran to see.

“On the bright side,” said Jay, wrapping an arm around Holly’s waist, “they may just start a wet teeshirt contest for you to judge.”

“As long as they don’t flood the floor I don’t care,” Holly said, trying to convince herself.  

“Yeah, if they make it rain on the downstairs neighbours you might not invite us back.”

“Holly,” said Sharky, leaning back from the fridge, “where d’ya keep the beer?”

_ I can’t believe you just dived in looking for it.  But considering where your hands have been, why should you hold back?   _ “I… don’t drink beer,” she admitted.  “There’s wine, or… actually, you know what?  Wait there.”  Relieved that she hadn’t completely given way to paranoia, she hurried into the bedroom (Ella and… she thought it was Kay were canoodling on her bed), found her wallet in the handbag hanging from the bedpost and took out a few bills.  “Quite comfortable?” she asked the two canoodlers, trying not to sound snippy but  _ honestly. _

“This bed is even comfier than it looks in your photos,” Kay said, having the decency to look mildly sheepish.  “Hey, we took our shoes off.”

“You can see why we had to test it out,” said Ella.  “You know.  Where the magic happens.”  The shower in the bathroom shut off and Skinny and Carnie emerged with their clothes very damp.  

“The tub has spa jets!” Carnie reported gleefully.

“I could have a long-term relationship with that showerhead,” said Skinny.

_ Oh God.  Just roll with it, Holly.   _ “Enjoy yourselves, just please keep the water  _ in _ the tub or the shower stall.”  She hurried back to the kitchen and held out the bills to Sharky.  “The cupboard’s a little bare because I shop on Sundays,” she said, “so could you do me a favour and run down to the store and get what you’d like?  Drinks, snacks, um… whatever.”

If Sharky was impressed by the amount she didn’t show it, just grinned.  “On it,” she said, taking the money between two fingers and tucking it in her hip pocket.

“I need MIke’s Hard Lemonade,” said Jay.

“Jesus,” said Sharky.  “You’re trying to get with a classy lady like Holly and you drink like you’re in grade school.”

“You just wish you had a signature drink.”

“I do, it’s called alcohol.  C’mon Chip, I need another set of arms.”

“Aw,” said Chip, who had been quietly pushing back the couches and rolling up Holly’s Turkish rug to clear a floor space for dancing, but she went along amiably.  She pocketed her phone, which cut off the music; someone else moved in to set up and started a song with a deep, pulsing beat that Holly didn’t recognise.  Jay, behind her, wrapped her arms around her waist and began to gently sway her.  Thank God she didn’t expect her to really dance.  The others were, in the space Chip had cleared, and even if Holly couldn't honestly say she liked the music yet she did like the way it made them move.  It was the style of dancing she normally found embarrassing to see because it seemed so brazenly sexual, but wasn't that appropriate here?  Pushing through the feeling of embarrassment was a kind of stimulant.  

She twisted round to face Jay and wrapped her arms around her neck, leaning in to kiss her again, soft deep desperate kisses that were far too close to the way she’d drunkenly kissed people in college.

“You feel like you needed this,” Jay mumbled, pushing her back against the counter island that divided the kitchen space from the living area and boosting her up to sit there and be further kissed.  Holly hitched her skirt above her knees again and wrapped her legs around Jay’s broad hips and tried to lose herself in the warmth of Jay’s mouth even while she argued with herself.

_ She’s only doing this because she saw me give Sharky money. _

_ I didn’t give Sharky money to kiss me.  She hasn’t touched me yet tonight. _

_ It shows I’m an easy ticket, a soft touch, generous if I’m buttered up, come  _ on,  _ there is  _ no _ reason for her to like  _ me _. _

_ I just don’t care.  If she’ll kiss me this way I’ll take it.   _ Jay’s warm hands were moving up her thighs, sliding under the ribbon suspenders, pushing the skirt up almost to her waist.  

  
(illustration by [molded-from-clay](http://molded-from-clay.tumblr.com/post/159749305337))

“I never got such a good look in person before,” Jay said, looking down between them.  “Hey, you don't have to suck your tummy in, you know I  _ like _ curvy girls.  I better, right?  I got some meat on my bones myself.  Hey, we’re going the wrong way with this.  Lift up.”  She tugged Holly's skirt down, under her bottom and over her legs, pulled it free and dropped it in the fruit bowl on top of the lemons and limes.  “Besides,” she said frankly as she pulled Holly's legs around her again and leaned in, “I’ve  _ felt _ everything you’ve got so you're not kidding me you're a size 4 now.”

_ Try 14.  16 on a bad day.  Shut the fuck up, Holly, you’re ruining this for yourself.   _ She reached to kiss Jay again, combing her fingers into her hair and knocking off her cap.  Her tongue was so soft and quick, and she made such sweet low sounds in her throat, little hums and purrs.  She wrapped one arm around Holly’s waist and slipped the other hand between her thighs, rolling her thumb over Holly’s mound.

“Hello Miss Silky Pussy,” she murmured, and Holly felt her smile.  “You’re so fancy.  Love all your silky fancy bits.”

The song on the stereo changed, and Holly thought  _ They shouldn’t know this song, it’s from  _ my  _ era.   _ “I’ve never known a girl like you before,” the voice sang, “now just like in a song from days of yore…”  It was from days of yore all right, she used to dance to this song in her bedroom and never had the nerve to do it in public.  It would have seemed like she thought too much of herself.  Just the fact that it made her feel sexy had seemed embarrassing and stupid.

“Never known a girl like you before,” Jay half-sang, half-whispered against her cheek.  She kissed Holly again, her fingers working steadily through the silk, bringing a soft, ticklish kind of pleasure into bloom, gradually leaning her back.  Holly locked her legs around Jay’s waist, tilting up her hips, whimpering eagerly, sucking at her tongue.  She was so used to trying to keep quiet in the magic circle that she had half-forgotten she could make sounds to encourage Jay.  The song went on, the beat of it got into her back and her hips, deep, liquid heat growing inside her, working against Jay’s strong fingers.   _ You made me acknowledge the devil in me, I hope to God I’m talking metaphorically, hope that I’m talking allegorically, know that I’m talking ‘bout the way I feel… _  Jay tugged the silk out of the way and slipped her middle and ring fingers inside, sliding smoothly in the wet and reaching deep.

“Oh God — oh God —” Holly panted, rolling her hips.  She realised she was gripping handfuls of Jay’s hair and snatched her hands away, only to grab her shoulders, gasping sharply as Jay’s fingers pushed her higher and the sweet tension inside her pulled tight, clutching and trembling as she came with a glorious rolling shudder.

_ And now you’ve come along, yes you’ve come along.   _ Holly swayed forward and leaned against Jay, sighing breathlessly.  

“Good?” Jay asked, nuzzling her cheek.  

“Oh yes…”  She drew a deep breath and sat back a bit, trying to compose herself.

“Hey, are you okay?  You look a little teary.”

“What?  Oh.”  Holly touched her face and found her cheek wet.  She gave a little startled laugh.  “Sometimes my eyes water.”

“Didn’t wanna think I’d made ya  _ cry _ fingering you on the kitchen counter.  I know it’s a little unhygienic, but nothing to cry over.”

“Not at all,” Holly agreed.  “It’s —”  She laughed again, shakily.  “It’s not something that’s happened on  _ this _ counter.”

“Well,  _ that’s  _ a damn shame,” said Jay.  She straightened Holly’s knickers and licked her fingers, looking her steadily in the eye, and laughed as she looked away and blushed.  “Okay, couldn’t resist.  You wanna put your skirt back on or take your top off?  I’d vote for top off but it’s your call.  I feel like it has to go one way or the other.”

“Wouldn’t I look a little silly in underwear when you’re all dressed?”

“Oh, that?”  Jay whipped off her jacket and pulled her teeshirt over her head.  Holly giggled and covered her mouth.  “Plus, that’s not gonna last with this crew.”

“Well, at least…”  Holly took a deep breath and pulled her top off, hoping she wasn’t ruining her hair in the process.

“Your tits don’t really need the help but they do look spectacular in that bra.”  Jay ran her finger under one shoulder strap admiringly.  “You really have great taste.”

“I think I do,” Holly said hopefully.  Her legs were still wrapped loosely around Jay’s hips and she tightened her hold a bit, pulling her into a hug.  Jay laughed and kissed her cheek.   _ I should find out her size and get her something nice.  Except I don’t think she’s wearing the right size, she might need to go up a cup.  Is it all right to just sit here hugging her?  Will she get bored? _  It felt so inexpressibly good, though, so warm and  _ comforting. _

  
(illustration by [snappy-lobster](http://snappy-lobster.tumblr.com/post/159701647653))

“You don’t get enough hugs either, do you?” Jay murmured.  “Got that skin hunger thing.  We’ll take care of you.  Chip is a hug  _ beast.”   _

“I think I do want to put on my kimono though.  Just for now.”

“Oh, the slinky black one from your photos?  Yes to that.”  Jay helped her down from the counter, grinning.  

In the bedroom Ella and Kay were gone, leaving the covers rumpled, and through the open bathroom door Carnie and Skinny could be seen lazing in a bath full to the brim with bubbles.

“You made yourselves at home,” Jay said, leaning in to flick some suds into Skinny’s face.  “So glad.  I was worried you’d be all inhibited and shit.”

“Nup,” said Skinny with her eyes closed.  

“She’s being sarcastic,” said Carnie, who had availed herself of Holly’s favourite cucumber and mint facial masque.

“Yup,” said Skinny.

“You do know that if you use bubble bath you can’t use the spa jets, yes?” Holly asked, tying her sash.  “It would be like putting liquid dish soap in a dishwasher.”

“Why can’t you put liquid dish soap in a dishwasher?” Skinny asked, opening one eye.

“Oh, so you’ve never flooded a kitchen with foam that way; if my greater experience of disaster can spare you  _ that _ I’ll be happy.”

“What you’re telling me is if we  _ had _ a dishwasher we could have a home foam party whenver we wanted.”

“Do  _ not _ put liquid soap in my dishwasher,” Holly said firmly.  “I won’t draw many lines but I draw one there.”

“Aw, damn,” Jay said behind her.  She had wandered back into the bedroom and was fossicking in the shoe trees in the wardrobe.  “I thought we might have about the same size feet but your shoes are just that bit too tight.”  She took off the d’Orsay pump she had been trying to put on and offered it to Holly.  “You should wear ‘em, though!  They’d look great with your outfit.”

“Are you just dressing me up?” Holly asked, stepping out of her mules..

“Yeah, you’re my Barbie.  Put ‘em on!  There we go, those heels make your legs and ass look  _ awesome.”   _ She rummaged deeper into the closet.  “Holy shit, you’ve got a  _ collection. _  Holy  _ shit,  _ have these got  _ locks _ on the ankles?”

“No no no,” said Holly, flustered.  “They just  _ look _ like locks, it’s only a push-button release.”

“Kinky shit, Holly,” said Jay, smirking.  She turned the shoes over to admire the smooth red soles.  “Oh.  But they look like you don’t wear them.”

“The ankle strap is too small,” Holly admitted.  “I ordered them online, I only thought about the foot size.”

“Oh, fuck ‘em then,” said Jay, tossing them to the back of the closet with a thump.  “Why didn’t you return ‘em?”

“I was embarrassed.”  Seeing the shoes again renewed the irrational sense of  _ failure _ she’d had.  Holly sat down on the side of her bed and looked at the d’Orsays, trying to reassure herself that at least they were beautiful and that the shiny stockings flattered her legs, even with thick ankles.

“Embarrassed to return shoes to a  _ website?”   _ Jay looked back over her shoulder incredulously.

“I don’t want to talk about it, and anyway, maybe they’ll fit one of  _ you.”   _

“Ooh, lookit these!  Also kinky shit, but corset lacing on the ankles!  I bet these fit.  Lemme put them on you.”  She shuffled over to Holly on her knees.

“I thought you liked these ones,” Holly said, but she held out one foot and let Jay slip the shoes off and the new pair on.

“Lemme guess, your favourite Disney princess was Cinderella.  There you go, all fancy.”

“You tie very nice bows.”  Holly held up her foot to admire it.  “Actually, I can’t remember caring all that much for Cinderella.”  She looked from her shoe to Jay, kneeling in front of her and looking up at her with a little knowing smile poised halfway between hope and confidence.   _ She’s just beautiful.   _ Holly bit her lip a moment, trying to embed the image in her memory, and then said, “Come up here.”

“Yeah?”  Jay lifted herself up and placed her hands on Holly’s knees, sliding them up her thighs as she leaned in to brush her lips against Holly’s.  

“No, come  _ here,  _ sit beside me.”

“Whatever you say.”  Jay shifted up beside her and gave her a long, sweet kiss, gently plucking at Holly’s lips with her own.

“It shouldn’t just be whatever I say.  I should be doing things for you too.  It’s always just been me receiving and don’t you think I should give too?” 

“Oh yeah.  When you’re good to Mama, Mama’s good to you.”  Jay threw her arms around Holly and rolled her over on the bed before she could quite process that she was being seduced via  _ Chicago _ reference.  They tumbled over together and Holly found herself on top, astride Jay’s sturdy body, and sank her fingers into Jay’s hair and kissed her desperately, swirling her tongue in the hot dark of her mouth.

“Tell me what you want,” she breathed as they broke apart.  

“Oh, man.  Everything?  Shit, I feel like I shouldn’t just be enjoying you all to myself… but fuck it, right?”

“Fuck it,” Holly agreed eagerly, then, “Wait, will the others be upset?”

“Nah, they’ll just give me shit about how I can’t wait.  But I can’t!  Never could.  Just a sec.”  She fumbled behind herself to unhook her bra and tugged it off, lying back with her arms over her head, her breasts rising and falling with her light, quick breathing.  “Kiss here,” she touched her lips, “and here,” she trailed her fingers down the side of her neck, “and here,” skimming over one plump brown nipple before her hand fell back to the bedclothes.  She gave one of those lovely soft purring moans as Holly obeyed, gently opening her mouth, her tongue fluttering.  Her breathing grew deeper and huskier as Holly worked her way down her neck, tasting her sweat, smelling of all things Dior J’adore, of course, Jay had loved the little golden-necked bottle.  Dior perfume on a girl who apparently didn’t shave under her arms.  Holly traced her fingertips down the concave curve and felt that the hair there was wispy soft.

_ I haven’t been  _ allowed _ to touch like this and  _ wanted _ to touch like this in so damn long.   _ Her eyes were threatening to water again but she ignored them and trailed her tongue down between Jay’s breasts before pressing them together with both hands to kiss the cleft between them.  She rolled her tongue over Jay’s nipples, feeling them prick and harden, hearing Jay whimper sweetly.

“Oh fuck… Holly, that’s so good.  Suck, please?   _ Yes.”   _

“What’re you pervs doing?” Skinny called out from the bathroom.  From the tub with the bathroom door open she could probably see Holly crouched over Jay, and Holly was suddenly afflicted with self-consciousness over how huge her backside must look in this position.

“Oh, no-thing!” Jay sang back, stroking Holly’s hair back from her forehead.  “Don’t let  _ them _ distract you,” she said in an undertone.  “I love what you’re doing.”

“Mm?” Holly looked up at her, swirling her tongue around the stiff bud in her mouth, hoping for more praise.

“Oh, the big pretty eyes!  Beautiful baby blues.  Jeez, I’m getting mushy,” she said, giggling.  “But I mean it.  Getting to see you like this is incredible.  You wanna touch my pussy?”  She drew in her breath and exhaled deeply, parting her thighs, gently jostling Holly.  “Here.”  She took Holly’s hands from her breasts and guided them down to her hips.  “Undo me.”  She was wearing greyish-black cut-offs over purple fishnets, with a belt with a big chunky silver buckle.  The buckle gave Holly a little trouble but the button fly popped apart easily, and she lifted her hips to help Holly pull the cutoffs down, drawing one leg up to kick her foot free.  Her underpants were gaudy pink boyshorts, faded from many washes and with a small but visible wet patch between her thighs.

“Fff… hold on.”  Holly was jostled again as Jay tried to push one of her sneakers off with the other foot.  “Didn’t think about  _ this _ when I got dressed,” Jay said, grinning.  “Got it.”  She kicked the shoe away and squirmed that leg out of her tights, Holly helping her to pull the fishnet down.

“I did,” Holly said.

“Thought about me getting dressed?  Well thank you.”

“No, I thought about getting  _ un _ dressed, that’s why I’m wearing the undies  _ over _ the garter belt.  It’s not as elegant but…”

“Riiight, so they come off easier.  Smart  _ and _ pretty.  Give me a little kiss right here?”  Jay touched her pink-covered mound.

  
(illustration by [sexy-crustacean](http://sexy-crustacean.tumblr.com/post/159623547721)) 

“Just a moment?”  Her heart pounding, Holly shuffled back to kneel on the floor by the bed, as if she were praying.  She kissed the spot just under Jay’s finger, feeling wiry hair shift crisply under her lips and the thin cheap cotton, nuzzling down to feel the soft plump lips and get a breath of the sharp hot smell of her cunt.

“Take ‘em off me,” Jay breathed, rolling her hips up, pushing at Holly’s chin.  “That’s it.  Oh, that’s good.  Oh Holly, look how hot you’ve got me.”  She drew up her knees, spreading her thighs, and reached down to part her labia with her fingers.  The inner lips were thick and plump with softly crumpled edges like wilted hibiscus petals.  

“So pretty,” Holly whispered, thinking aloud.  “Can I?”

Jay chuckled, pulling back her hand.  “No, I’m shoving it in your face just to tease you.  C’mon, get a taste.”

Holly held her breath and pressed her lips to Jay’s, feeling them squash softly, sliding smoothly on their wet inner surfaces, while her hair lightly scratched at her nose.  She breathed out slowly, ticklishly, and in, deeply, opened her mouth and tentatively licked, just the tip of her tongue against the plump lips, tasting salt and copper.  She felt a deep pulse in her own pussy.

“God,” said Jay faintly.  “Go on.”  Holly licked again, softly, tracing the borders, growing bolder and nudging her tonguetip between the lips where the taste was so much stronger.  Jay moaned sweetly, and when Holly looked up she saw her eyes were drifting closed and she was nibbling at her lower lip.  Her hands were loosely curled at her sides and her fingers fluttered as Holly drew her tongue up in repeated feather-strokes.  Holly nuzzled closer, and it seemed appropriate that she’d thought of this position as like praying for two chief reasons; she felt worshipful and she was praying her comparative inexperience and extreme rustiness weren’t obvious.  Months became years far too quickly and once you were into  _ years _ since you’d touched an actual other human being in any kind of intimate way it almost stopped mattering.  You were stuck, that mattered; for exactly how long was academic.

_ I’m not stuck now, I’m not, I’m  _ un _ stuck for sure.   _ Jay was moving gently, rhythmically under the stroke of her tongue, her hips and back flexing and her tummy slightly undulating.  She made very soft little sounds, sighs and hums, no really dramatic moans, and Holly could feel her getting wetter still, her pussy seeming to well up as she parted the inner lips and dipped down to the snug mouth of her cunt.  Back up between thick, silky folds, and she very gently, lightly touched the hood of Jay’s clitoris, working the fold of tender skin back and forth just a bit.  Jay inhaled sharply with a hiss between her teeth and reached for Holly’s head, stroking her hair.

“I really like it if you  _ kiss,” _ she said, “kiss and suck a little bit.  Use — use your tongue  _ with _ that… oh yes… fuck yes, that’s exactly…”  She gasped, and her startled expression melted into a fierce smile.   _ “Yes.”   _ Her breathing roughened and the tension in her body grew; Holly could feel her thighs tightening under her hands.  She sealed her lips over the taut bud, not completely sure if she was kissing or sucking, but swirling and rolling her tongue, and for the first time Jay made a louder sound, another gasp with a sharp squeak to it.  “More,” she demanded, “more more more.”  Holly obeyed, her heart drumming, taking one hand from Jay’s thigh to press between her own, unable to co-ordinate actually masturbating while she concentrated on Jay but just as unable to do without touching herself.

Jay was getting noisier still, moving her hips more urgently, her rapid breathing a series of throaty “aah”s and gasps, her thighs quivering and twitching until they closed on Holly’s head and she went silent again, her eyes closed and her mouth open, lips trembling, as all her focus turned inward for a few long ecstatic moments.  The grip of her thighs loosened and she lay still, still breathing deeply but with all the tension gone.  Holly sat back on her heels and tried to catch her own breath; those last moments of Jay’s orgasm had been quite smothering.  She really took in for the first time the contrast between the quiet elegance of her room and the bright tawdry colours of Jay’s clothes, one leg still encased in laddered purple fishnet and the pink boyshorts dangling off the other foot.  The bra lying on the Egyptian cotton quilt was pink too, but didn’t match; polyester satin.   _ Why am I such a fucking snob?  She’s so utterly beautiful and we’re doing such wonderful things and I’m judging her  _ clothes.

“I kind of need a hug after I come like that,” Jay said, her voice weak.

“Oh!  I’m sorry.”  Holly scrambled up on the bed and rolled Jay into her arms. 

“Sokay.  First time together and all.”  Jay wrapped her own arms tight round Holly’s waist and pressed her cheek to hers.  She just held tight for a minute or so before she gave a little chuckle.  “When you’re good to Mama, Mama’s  _ really _ good to you.”

“Oh, so it was okay?”

“O _ kay?” _  That made Jay giggle.

“Well, I don’t exactly  _ know,  _ as you say, first time together.”

“Mmm, kinda.  Your first time getting  _ me _ off.  I feel like I know my way around  _ you _ a little, but I’m looking forward to getting  _ really _ acquainted.”  She drew back and looked into Holly’s face fondly for a moment before kissing her.  “We should go back, or it really is gonna start looking like I’m keeping you to myself.”

“I just want to go to the bathroom first.  Do you… want to borrow something to wear?” _  Or is she just planning to be naked for the rest of the evening?  I don’t know what they do. _

“Like a bathrobe or PJs or something?  Or are ya planning to dress  _ me _ up in lingerie too?” Jay asked, grinning.

“Oh my goodness.  I would  _ love _ to see you in — I have a pair of silk pyjamas that would be perfect.”  They had been a gift several years ago from a cousin who had underestimated her size a bit, and again she’d felt too ashamed and discouraged to try to exchange them, but they ought to fit Jay beautifully.  She scrambled off the bed and found them in her bottom drawer.  Jay sat up on the bed, one leg bent and her thighs still sprawled apart, and leant on her hands.

“Those  _ are _ really pretty,” she said.  “Okay, thanks.”  She pulled on the camisole top first before peeling off the last leg of her tights and slipping on the pants.  Holly held her breath a moment before it was clear they were an excellent fit, neither loose nor tight, and now Jay absolutely looked as if she belonged in this room.  Well, allowing for the fact that her hair was currently bleached and dyed a sort of peach-pink that ombred through to lavender at the ends.

“You look gorgeous,” she said with feeling.  “I just want to quickly go to the bathroom before we — yes.”

Skinny and Carnie were still lounging in the bath, though Carnie had wiped off her masque.  She held out one bubble-dripping arm with her palm out towards Holly; it took her a moment to realise she meant it for a high-five and respond appropriately.  

“Way to get Jay off, Miss Holly.”

“Why, thank you!”  She turned toward the mirror, riding on a swell of accomplishment, and stopped in dismay.  “Ugh.  I have to redo my entire face.”  Her make-up had rubbed off from nose to chin and her bare skin was flushed and shiny.

“Why?” Skinny asked.  

“Well, look.”

“At what?  You’ve got sex face is all.”

“I think you look cute, all rosy,” said Carnie.  “You should see how red I get.  And I really like your… what are those?  Like girly boxers.”

“French knickers,” said Holly, dabbing at her face with a cotton pad.

“You look fine,” said Jay, leaning in the doorway.  “You shouldn’t worry.”

“Ooh, look at you,” said Carnie.

“I know!  Holly stripped me off and dressed me up.  This is some  _ Pretty Woman _ shit, right?” Jay twirled around.  “Hey Holly, got anything for these two to put on?  Unless you’re just staying in there forever.  Growing gills.  Not getting anything to eat when Sharky gets back.”

“I hope she remembers curly fries,” said Carnie.  “Not sure it’s worth getting out of this tub if there are no curly fries.”

“It’s a  _ really nice tub,” _ Skinny stage-whispered.  She levered herself out of the bubbles and sat on the rim of the bath a moment.  “Whew!  Got that hot bath head rush.”  Holly was completely distracted from worrying about her own face, staring at the way the watery suds ran down Skinny’s wiry body, at her tiny pointed breasts and the gleaming orange gem in a silver piercing in her navel.

“Um,” she said.  “I — I won’t have anything in your exact sizes, but — but just a moment.”

“I think she’d rather you din’t wear anything at all,” she heard Carnie say as she went to the bureau.  

“Yeah, but I know it’s a weird hang-up, but I feel weird eating naked.  Eating  _ food _ naked, shut up.”  There was a loud splash and Jay jumped backwards out of the bathroom, laughing.  Holly shook her head and found the nightshirts she was looking for; Skinny and Carnie would be swimming in them but they were satiny and pretty so they wouldn’t feel she favoured them less than Jay.  She was already spinning a dream in her head where they would come over regularly and she would have special pyjamas for all of them, even while thinking how weird and absurd that was, and what broke into it was Sharky shouting from the foyer, “Food’s here, bitches!”  
  
  
  


 

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I FORGOT I wanted to share here:
> 
>  
> 
> [Here's "Never Met A Girl Like You Before" by Edwyn Collins, Holly's official getting fingerbanged on the kitchen counter song.](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iYFz4pKclyA)
> 
>  
> 
> [Holly Blue Agate's voice actress Christine Pedi has recorded a _lovely_ version of the song "When You're Good to Mama" from the musical _Chicago_ and you should really listen to it if you enjoy good things for your ears.](http://molded-from-clay.tumblr.com/post/159395762327/um-you-guys-this-is-holly-blue-agates-va)
> 
>  
> 
> [These are the shoes Holly was too embarrassed to return, a truly massive waste of money, but if they were the right size for her ankles wouldn't they look amazing on her?](http://asia.christianlouboutin.com/au_en/shop/women/fetish.html)
> 
>  
> 
> [These are the shoes Jay put on her, also gorgeous.](http://asia.christianlouboutin.com/au_en/shop/women/ferme-rouge-nappa.html)
> 
>  
> 
> [And these are truly extravagant purple sneakers she's probably going to buy for the Famethysts one of these days.](http://asia.christianlouboutin.com/au_en/shop/women/bip-bip-strass-woman-flat-mtl-sue-glos-pa-glit-tis-strass.html)


	3. Chapter 3

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Oh my gosh this took for freaking ever. N.B. recreational drug and alcohol use in this chapter like whoa. And a lot of very silly sex but I take it that's what you came for.

“Fuckin’ A,” said Jay, “I’m starved.”  Holly followed her to the living room where a kind of floor picnic was getting laid out where the others had just been dancing.  Sharky had clearly taken Holly at her word about buying whatever they’d like; there was a case of beer, pillow-sized bags of chips and cheesy things, three pizza boxes, a bucket of chicken, assorted other bottles and cans and a cardboard tray of curly fries that Carnie pounced on.  It was impressive that the two of them had managed to carry it all; it must have been a feat of balancing worthy of Cirque du Soleil.  Holly looked at all the food, hesitated, and went to the kitchen to pour herself a glass of wine.  

She almost spilled it down her front when Chip hugged her from behind.  “Jay said you’d like that,” she said, and clinked her beer bottle against Holly’s glass.

“Oh!  Thank you.”  She was suddenly acutely conscious that she must still smell like Jay, that the smell would linger on her face and her neck, that the others were bound to notice it and work out what they’d done, and that was sort of thrilling but also deeply, deeply embarrassing.  Then again, for all she knew everyone had come round and had a good look through the bedroom door while she was doing it; she wouldn’t have noticed under the circumstances unless they’d whistled to get her attention.  None of this was  _ supposed _ to be a secret or private, the way these girls tended to share everything, and she would just need to get used to that.

“C’mon,” Chip said and towed her over to the others.  Sharky grabbed her around the waist and pulled her to sit on her lap on the smaller couch.

“Thanks for the feast,” she said, grinning, and gave Holly a quick soft smooch, heavy on the upper lip.  She drew back looking a little puzzled, blinked, and then announced to the room at large, “I shouldn’t’ve bought so much food, ‘cuz I think Holly just ate.”  

A chorus of whoops and ribald laughter went up, and drinks were raised high.  Jay grinned and actually blushed as she opened a bottle of Mike’s and took a swig.

“Shh,” Holly begged them, “the neighbours aren’t deaf.”  She felt as if she were full of champagne bubbles, though; it was just ridiculous to be so puffed up but she couldn’t stop herself giggling.  Sharky helped herself to a generous handful of Holly’s thigh and gave it a friendly squeeze.  

“Hey, I didn’t say yet but you look fantastic.”  She smacked a kiss onto the upper slope of Holly’s breast where the silk kimono was falling away.  “You’re so damn  _ fancy.   _ Like a forties movie star or something.”

“Or Vargas girls,” said Chip, layering two slices of pizza with the topping sides in like a sort of sandwich.  “Or Elvgren.”

“Chip is gonna be a famous tattoo artist and ink foxy pinup ladies on everyone,” said Ella proudly.

“You got any tattoos we haven’t seen, Holly?” Sharky asked, drawing a spiral on Holly’s thigh with her forefinger.

“Oh no.  Goodness, no.”  She was a little startled to be asked; it just seemed it should be  _ obvious _ that she wouldn’t have tattoos.  “You’ve seen almost everything I have, anyway.”

“Seen mine?” Jay leaned across Sharky’s lap to flex her arm and show off a purple geometric design inked over her deltoid muscle.  “It’s an enneagram.  It’s a model of the human psyche!”

“You just thought it looked cool,” Chip pointed out.  “Not that there’s anything wrong with that, it’s not like you got a Chinese character that turns out to mean dumbass.”

“Did you  _ do _ that?” Holly asked, startled.

“Yeah.  I’m still training, but that’s mine,” Chip said with a small proud smile.

“That’s  _ very _ impressive.”  The intersecting lines inside the circle were so neat and straight and the colour so vivid, and it didn’t hurt that it was on a very shapely arm.  She traced her fingertip over it, expecting it to feel ridged or scarred, but it was as smooth as the skin around it, buttery soft with light peach-fuzz hair.  

“Yeah?  I can do piercings too, and my boss runs a good clean shop, we hardly poison anyone.  You want anything done?”

“Oh!  No.  No, I don’t think that would be wise, I mean, not in my industry.  I need to keep up a professional image.”   _ And I’d look ridiculous.   _ She was feeling flustered from multiple directions at once, but particularly from the way Sharky was still fondling her thigh, sliding her hand up its underside to knead at her bottom through her knickers, gazing appreciatively at her breasts.

“Your boss ain’t gonna see you’ve got my name tattooed across your ass,” said Sharky, giving it a little squeeze, and Holly took a quick deep swig of her wine to hide her confusion.  

“I wouldn’t recommend anyone  _ ever _ to get Sharky’s name on their ass but you can get a hundred things done that won’t show when you’re suited up,” Chip said, shrugging.

“She did this,” said Sharky, poking out her cheek piercing from inside with her tongue, “and her boss did this.”  She opened her mouth to display the steel barbell in her tongue itself, gazing up at Holly with lazy, half-lidded eyes, so very obviously provoking and teasing her and very pleased with herself for doing it.  On impulse, before she could lose her nerve, Holly pretty much stuck her tongue in Sharky’s open mouth and felt it close on her own lips eagerly.  Sharky moaned joyfully, swirling her tongue against Holly’s, and a chorus of whoops and cheers went up around them.

“Get it, Holly!”

“Only way to shut her up!”

The attention and approval went to her head like a charm; she felt an evanescent rush of confidence and pulled back with an emphatic smack of her lips before stealing Sharky’s beer bottle from her unresisting hand and taking a deep swig.  It tasted fairly foul to her but the  _ gesture _ was the thing.  They were hooting and cackling with laughter and for a wonder she didn’t feel like the target.  She held the bottle high as a sort of salute to all of them before pushing it back into Sharky’s hand and getting to her feet with a flourish of her free arm.  

Sharky had been fumbling at the belt of her kimono as she kissed her, and the front of the short robe fell open as she stood.  She hadn’t quite intended for one whole sleeve to slide off her shoulder, but clearly everyone approved.  She took another quick gulp of rosé both to take away the beer taste and to keep up her Dutch courage.

Jay pulled her back down, wedged between her and Sharky, and smooched her on the cheek.  “That’s more like it,” she said.  “There’s the fun slutty girl I knew was in there somewhere!”  Giddily, Holly grabbed the strap of Jay’s camisole to pull her in close and kissed her soft mouth.  The thought that she could just kiss whoever she wanted and be welcome and wanted in return was going to her head, and the girls were  _ so _ beautiful.

Sharky craned over and grabbed the chicken bucket, dug out a drumstick and offered the bucket to Holly and Jay.  Holly hesitated for her habitual moment of worry about looking like a pig before taking a piece; everyone else was happily digging in so she would make herself more conspicuous by not eating than she could if she ate messily or looked greedy.  She pulled apart the joints of a wing and told herself it wouldn’t make that much difference anyway.  That, and it was hot and greasy and salty and delicious.  This all felt so cosy, almost as if it were normal for them to be here, for her apartment to be full of their noise and laughter and mess, as if it it had just been waiting for them to arrive.  Everyone was chattering and bottles were clinking and the music was still pulsing  around them.  

Holly didn’t yet feel like  _ part _ of it, but she was in amongst it.  She noticed Carnie was deftly rolling a somewhat illicit-looking cigarette.  Carnie noticed  _ her _ watching before she could look away, and raised her eyebrows.  “You’re not straight edge or anything are ya, Holls?”

“Oh God no, I don’t care,” she said hastily, “just don’t leave anything burning on the furniture.”

“Fuck’s sake,” said Skinny, “Holly works in advertising.  Weed is tame to her.  Her sort are all doing lines off the secretary’s titties.”

“That is a  _ wild _ exaggeration,” Holly said.  “I share an executive assistant with another person and he has no titties to speak of.”

“Seriously, you do coke, Holly?” Sharky asked, snickering.

“It’s  _ around _ but I never wanted to try it,” Holly admitted, wrapping up her chicken bones in a paper napkin.  “When I was a kid I once saw a picture of an actress who’d lost the — the little divider in her nose, you know, she had one big nostril and they said it was from cocaine… I know that’s an extreme example but blecch.”

“Septum,” said Chip, laughing.  “It’s your septum.”

“Thank you, I knew that, the word just wouldn’t come.”

“Well, we partake of herbaceous refreshments and the occasional pill but yeah, nothing that’ll rot your nose out,” Carnie said, smirking.  She started clicking a lighter, swearing when it wouldn’t co-operate.

“I got it,” Skinny said calmly, taking the lighter and making it work first try.

“I hate you,” Carnie said fondly, putting the tip of the joint into the flame and inhaling deeply before passing it on to Skinny.  She waited a moment before exhaling a soft waft of smoke, and said, “So I thought, what if the joint goes round the circle one way and Holly goes round the other?”

_ Passed around, _ Holly thought, sucking her fingers clean.  Her cheeks felt hot and her lips were tingly, though she wasn’t sure if it was from arousal or nerves or just drinking her wine too quickly.  She hoped she wasn’t getting  _ too _ red in the face; even with the reassurance they’d given her in the bathroom she still didn’t want to be all sweaty and cherry-cheeked.  She was feeling a constant ticklish tug down low in her pussy and it only got stronger at the thought of being shared like that.

“What happens if they cross?  Someone gets ‘em both at the same time?” Ella asked.

“Then Holly gets a hit.  That’s just good manners.”

“As usual, Carnie with the genius plan.”

“You wanna do that, Holly?” Jay asked.  “Do the grand tour?”

_ “Yes.” _

“Then we pass to the left and Holly goes to the right,” said Sharky, “and oh my  _ goodness, _ look who’s on her right?”  She wedged her beer between the couch cushions to hold Holly’s hips with both hands and guided her to sit astride her lap.  Her focus shifted to Holly’s face and her eyes softened.  “So show me what that mouth do.”  Holly heard people laughing, guessed that was a joke she didn’t know, hoped it wasn’t at her expense but didn’t care while she was kissing Sharky.  She felt someone take the wineglass from her hand; good, that freed her up to concentrate on this, on the way Sharky’s hands surged from her thighs to her hips and the way the hard metal bead in her tongue twirled as she moved it.  It felt like she was allowed to play with it, like Sharky was playing with her in return, flickering and fluttering her tongue against the soft inside of her lips, slowly tracing the edges of her teeth.

She felt a hand on her arm, in addition to Sharky’s hands on her ass, and it gave her a gentle shake.

“Uh?”  She looked up, dazed.  

“Pass the Holly,” said Chip, smiling.  

“Awwwww…” Sharky moaned.  “Okay, off ya go.”  She gave Holly a little smack on the ass to send her off.  “Can I get some more of that later?”

“Of course you can.   _ I _ need some more of that later.”

“Yeah you do.”

“But you might forget about her when you’re with me,” Chip said, taking Holly’s hand and leading her to sit on the floor with her, astride her lap.  “Come here.”  Kissing one girl after another was making Holly very aware of how different each one was, not only obvious differences like the studs in Sharky’s tongue and cheek and the smoothed-off chipped tooth that seemed to be the reason for Chip’s nickname, but how each one’s mouth tasted different, each one’s skin smelled different because of her own internal chemistry, even before you got to the tastes and smells layered over that.  There was beer and there was salt and spice and there was perfume and there was sweat; the room seemed to be heating up just because there were so many warm bodies in it. 

_ I could take off my kimono.  I  _ should _ take off my kimono or I’ll just end up with sweat circles under the arms.  It’s half off anyway.  This lingerie was hand-made in Italy and I haven’t even taken any pictures in it, it should at least be seen.  So what if they see all of me?  But I can’t choose the angle and make it a flattering position, they’ll just  _ see _ me moving around and — and  _ folding _ and  _ jiggling _. _

Either Chip had read her mind or just had her own priorities; she drew back from a kiss, slid her hands under the robe’s collar and asked, “Can I take this off you?”  Being directly asked didn’t take the decision out of Holly’s hands but at least it gave her some confidence about what they  _ wanted _ her to choose, and that was a relief.

“Yes.”  It slid off easily, she only had to slip her arms free from the sleeves, and there were whistles and murmurs of admiration from all around them.  She glanced around and found familiar lecherous grins, although they were more affectionate than she remembered them being on the train.  The champagne feeling bubbled up again, becoming an irrepressible smile, and she leaned into Chip’s arms again.

Each time she was passed on she didn’t really want to go, but then she would get caught up in the next girl and how  _ she _ touched her.  She knew she was getting increasingly dishevelled, her hair especially falling into loose squiggly strands around her face and neck, but also caring about it less.  Some of them pulled her to her feet and danced with her and kindly overlooked her complete and utter lack of rhythm.  Someone brought her another glass of wine and she drained it; she crossed paths with the joint and managed to inhale without coughing and felt ridiculously proud.  Ella took her bra off, after which her breasts were kissed as much as her mouth was, and she received her second orgasm of the evening from Gigi, who she’d hardly even talked to before but who was wonderfully deft with her fingers, or perhaps it just didn’t take much when she was this excited.  Around her the music throbbed on, and they talked and laughed, the air took on a definite grassy fragrance, there was kissing and touching and layers of clothing were  shed.  

“You want to keep these on?  They’re getting pretty soaked.”  Skinny tugged gently at the damp silk between Holly’s legs as she sat in her lap on the couch.

“Umm… yes and no.  I love the feeling of having wet underwear on.  Like when I get off the train after being with all of you, and I’m  _ so _ wet, and my pussy’s so sensitive, and the fabric’s clinging to me, and I’m so conscious of it all the way home, my dirty little secret.”  Holly knew she was tipsy now, and tipsy meant chatty and overly confiding.  

“That’s fuckin’ awesome,” Skinny said, sliding her fingers behind the silk to stroke the folds of her lips.  “So in a way we’re still tickling you up all the way home too, right?”

“Right.  From the very first time Jay touched me.”

“And all she did that time was rub your hips a little bit.  Didja know you were so horny?  Or did we just bring it out?”  Skinny frowned a little, quizzical, and her fingers slowed down.  “Hey, did you even know you were gay?”

Holly didn’t mean to laugh in her face, she tried to hold it in, but that only meant it was preceded by an unseemly snort.  “Oh, I’m sorry.  Sorry!”  She couldn’t stop giggling, though.  “I think I probably knew I was a lesbian before you knew your three times table.”   _ Oh God, Holly, don’t  _ remind _ them how much older you are, what’s wrong with you? _

“Wouldn’ta known it,” Skinny said, mercifully not seeming offended, even smiling lazily.  “You were trying so hard to be all respectable in your suits.  It’d make sense if you were trying to be straight too, trying to fit in…”  She eased two fingers into Holly’s cunt, stretching and curling them in a steady beckoning motion.  “And we just helped you see you didn’t need that respectable shit.”  

_ I still need it, you silly girl, I have to live in the real world unlike some.  Change the damn subject.   _ “I also knew I was desperately horny but I didn’t know I’d find all of you to help me deal with it.”         

“Pleased to be of service,” Skinny said, smirking.

“If you move your fingers just a little, little deeper and forward…. oh, there, stroke me there.”  Warm ripples spread out from the place Skinny was touching now and she shivered.

“Pass the Holly!” said Carnie, clambering onto the arm of the couch.

“Fuck off, I just found her G-spot,” Skinny said.  “It’s deep in, not sure you could reach it.  Izzat good, Holly?  Oh, look at her face, she’s gone.”

“What’s wrong with my face?” Holly asked plaintively, brought back from the slow swell of pleasure she’d been riding.

_ “Nothing _ is wrong with your face, you’ve got this great blissed-out look on it, that’s all.  Don’t get distracted thinking ‘bout your face.  Think about your pussy and all the great things happening in there, yeah?  Your sweet spot’s getting all hot, I can feel it, it’s swelling, it’s so juicy, are you gonna squirt for me?”

“I d-don’t know, I sometimes… ah…”  Holly leaned her forehead against Skinny’s, losing her words as the swell grew again.  

“That’s it.  Feel that.  Right there, deep in your pussy, that’s where you need it, right?  I’ll get it for you, don’t worry.”

Holly made a kind of humming sound; she was burning and she could feel Carnie stroking her hair and of course other people had been watching her this entire time, that was part of the  _ point,  _ but she’d just focused in on each one she was with and so far only one had touched her at a time, and oh God both of them touching her made everything that much more intense.  She wasn’t sure she  _ wanted _ any sort of ejaculation to happen, it would feel like such a loss of control, but that was sort of the point too, you didn’t get off on being felt up by a crowd on the train or passed around like a joint if you didn’t have  _ some _ sort of desire to give up control.   _ If it happens I’ll let it happen, oh God I’m so close, this feels so good, I can’t… _

The tension broke and she cried out in startled joy at the deep, plunging pulse inside her.  She had been arching out of Skinny’s lap, tensing her bottom and thighs, and in the moment of release felt a hot wet spurt escape from her and spray around Skinny’s fingers.  

“Go Holly!” Carnie cried, and there were other cries of praise, and her head was spinning and her pussy was throbbing and she was so overwhelmed she could only sag back into Skinny’s lap and stare at the ceiling and catch her breath for a while.  Skinny was still smoothly, slowly sliding her fingers in and out, gradually decreasing her stroke until they were still.  She kissed Holly’s cheek.

“Good girl.  Came like a champ.  And hey.  If you like wet undies you should be  _ super _ happy now.”

“Oh my God,” Holly said faintly.  She could feel the hot liquid soaking farther into the silk under her; it was getting wet almost to the waistband.  She didn’t even want to look at the state of the couch seat.  It was like when you spilled just a little drink and it went  _ everywhere. _

“You may call me that if you wish,” said Skinny, and sniggered when Carnie shoved her in the shoulder.

“I… I’m sorry, Carnie, I need a little rest…” Holly faltered.

“Don’t say  _ sorry,” _ Carnie said.  “You can stop whenever.”

“This was your idea, though… for me to go round everyone...”

“Just for fun.  Not a fuckin’ obligation.  Don’t worry about it.”

“Holly, I’m just gonna squeak out from under you, ‘cuz I really need to pee,” Skinny said, wriggling out and off the couch.  “Check out  _ my _ wet spot.”  The whole lap area of the borrowed nightshirt was damp.  She pulled it off over her head and just strolled away.

“Skinny’s naked, it’s a party,” said Jay, wandering over with drink in hand.

“I got naked like an hour ago in the bathroom, this is the encore,” Skinny said over her shoulder as she disappeared into Holly’s room.

“Have you only been here an hour?” Holly asked, trying to sit up a bit.  “It feels like longer.  Because so much has happened,” she added hastily, afraid it sounded like a hint for them to leave.

“I dunno how long it’s been, and Skinny’s shit at telling time,” said Carnie, shrugging.  “Does it matter?”

“Not really.  I was just surprised.”  

“How’s it going, mamacita?” Jay asked, bending low to kiss her a little sloppily.  She tasted of sticky lemons.

“Everything is  _ wonderful. _  Except it looks like I’ve wet my pants.”

“Let’s take those off before you get cold,” Jay suggested, setting her bottle on the floor and helping Holly up.

“The sluttiest mom friend strikes again,” said Carnie, stealing the bottle and chugging it down.

“Hey.  I take care of people,” Jay said, pulling Holly’s wet knickers down while she leant on her.  “You wanna keep the stockings on?  Yeah?  Thought so, they look so hot on you.  You want a little cuddle and a chillout?”

“Mmhm.”  Holly stepped out of the saturated silk, feeling the air touch her damp skin with a little shiver, and left them crumpled on the floor, letting Jay lead her to the other couch.

“You know, you’re amazing.  You’re up on those high heels and you’re steady as a rock.  Hey look,  _ convenient.”  _  Jay took the cotton throw from the arm of the couch and wrapped it around Holly like a blanket, guiding her to lie down in her arms.  “Your place has everything, doesn’t it?”

“Take up the whole couch,” Sharky grunted, coming over and shoving their feet away so she could sit.

“Fuck off, we’re spooning,” said Jay calmly, but she rearranged her legs with Holly’s so their knees were more bent and there was room for Sharky’s butt at the end of the seat, and nuzzled Holly’s cheek as she hugged her tight.  “Does that feel good, Mama?”

_ “Mama?” _ Sharky repeated, to Holly’s vast embarrassment.  She’d thought that was a  _ private _ joke.  It was a  _ joke,  _ right?  Jay wasn’t saying she actually found her motherly?

“When you’re good to Mama, Mama’s good to you,” Jay sang.  “Me and Holly were talking about  _ reciprocity.” _

“Oh.  Good song, but I like the Cicero Lipschitz one better,” Sharky said, shrugging.  She swigged her beer and reached over to stroke Holly’s ankle.  “You’re not fading on us, are you Mama?  I’ll get you a Red Bull.”

“No, I just… just want a little rest, I’m overstimulated as much as anything.”  It would probably be impossible to sleep with all these people around, let alone the music.  Someone had dimmed the lights right down, she hadn’t noticed when.  She was vaguely watching Kay, doing a slinky little dance by herself, peeling off her tank top to reveal small, pointed breasts with a purple octopus tattooed between them, its tentacle arms curling under and around them.  Chip and Gigi were undressing each other on the other couch, regardless of the wet patch, and Chip’s illustrated skin was undulating, the flowering vines and jewel-scaled snakes wrapped around her arms seeming to dance too, snakes and vines and tentacles sinuously embracing sleek young bodies.

Holly wondered if she was a little bit stoned as well as tipsy; she had only had one full drag from the joint but there was more than one being shared and the air was just a trifle hazy.  She could laugh about Skinny suggesting she might be a late bloomer sexually but she was definitely not telling the girls that she’d never actually been high and wasn’t sure what it was supposed to feel like.  Her drugs were alcohol and caffeine, which she supposed was terribly boring of her, and although they could certainly make you feel weird if you overindulged they’d never yet made her think anything that strange or florid about tattoos.

_ You’re probably just being a suggestible idiot.  Like sneaking a drink with Cousin Iris and thinking we were soooooooo drunk because we were fourteen and egging each other on to feel that way.  Oh, I had one decent puff of cannabis and sat in a room where other people were smoking it and I’m sooooooo stoned.  Don’t embarrass yourself more than you really have to, Holly. _

With an effort she turned away from the bitter thoughts and concentrated on how good it felt to have Jay’s arms wrapped around her and her strong body curled around hers.  She was comforting but a little fidgety; she breathed softly and steadily against Holly’s shoulder, and dabbed tiny kisses on her neck and her ear, and played with her hands under the blanket, interlacing their fingers or circling her thumb in Holly’s palm, as if she couldn’t quite  _ stop _ herself playing with her constantly.

“Hey Holly,” she murmured.

“Hmm?”

“We could go to bed if you want to lie down.  Be more comfortable.”  

“You might just wanna take your fuck-me shoes off so you don’t rip the sheets,” Sharky pointed out, still stroking her ankle.

“I’m not quite ready to go to bed  _ yet.” _

“That’s okay.  It’s your party, we’ll do whatever you want.”

“It’s my party?” Holly repeated, amused.

“Well, it’s your  _ place.” _

“You brought the party though.”  She wanted to roll over to face Jay and kiss her but she was afraid she couldn’t do it without falling off the couch.  “Let’s sit up.”  She still felt hazy and tipsy but that physically overwhelmed feeling had faded; she didn’t need to lie limp any more.  Sitting up gave her a brief head rush and she leaned against Jay, giggling.

“Holy shit you’re cute,” Jay said, beaming.  “Sharky, look how cute Holly is.”

“Could I have the Red Bull now?” Holly asked.  

“Yeah, hold on.”  Sharky rummaged in a plastic bag on the floor and came up with the can; it felt room temperature and Holly opened it doubtfully and took a sip.

“Dear  _ God _ that’s nasty,” she said.  

“Have you seriously never drunk Red Bull before?”

“Not since college.  I’d forgotten how foul it is.  I wonder if they do it on purpose.  You taste it and it’s so bad you think ‘Well, it must  _ work _ or no one would drink it.’”

“It works,” Sharky said dryly, “so don’t turn your nose up, duchess.”

“I’m not.  Thank you,” Holly said, and knocked back as much as she could stand in one gulp.  Her head was clearing a little, though again, she thought just  _ thinking _ there was caffeine in her system was having that effect.  She could hear the shower going again and she wasn’t altogether sure where everyone was, but it seemed unimportant now.  Ella passed by the couch, kissed Sharky’s cheek and passed her a joint before moving on toward the bathroom.

“Did you get any of that earlier, Holly?” Sharky asked, putting it to her lips.

“Only a taste,” Holly said.  “It wasn’t my focus.  That’s putting it mildly.”

“Well, that’s not fair.  You want?”

“Yes please.”  Might as well find out what it was supposed to feel like.

“Here.”  Sharky passed it over and Holly did her best to take it as if she wasn’t thinking about how to hold it to look normal and casual.  She began to inhale but a tiny flake of something caught in her throat and she coughed.  Jay made soothing noises and rubbed between her shoulderblades.

“It’s funny,” Sharky said, retrieving the joint before Holly could drop it, “‘cuz you’re older than us and a woman of the world and everything but then you don’t really know how to smoke and you seem really young.”

“I know all kinds of things,” Holly said, defensive.  “I never considered smoking weed a life skill.”

“It’s okay,” said Jay.  “We’ll teach you.  It’s what bad girls do.  Corrupt good girls like you.”

“Here,” said Sharky, offering it to her again.  “Try taking a sip instead of a gulp, okay?  Just ‘til you’re used to it.  We just wanna get you a nice gentle buzz for starters.”

“You don’t need to hold it till you turn blue.  That’s it.  That’s good.  And pass it on.”  Jay dropped her a little wink as she took the joint from her hand.  

Holly exhaled, a little more smoothly.  “What do I do now?”

“You relax and let it work.”  She drew on it deeply, closing her eyes in satisfaction.

“And you pass it back to Sharky,  _ thank _ you.”

“How could I forget.”  Jay passed it behind Holly’s head and then settled her arm around her shoulders, stroking through the cotton throw she still held around her.  “You cold, baby?”

“No.  Just… just habit to cover up, I suppose.”   _ No one wants to see that.  Except you want to see that but I’m still not used to it. _

“Don’t.  You’re overdressed for the event.”  She dotted a kiss against the side of Holly’s neck, tickling her.  “You’ve got the best outfit here.”

“I’ve got the  _ least _ outfit here,” Holly said, giggling.  She tried dropping the throw from one shoulder and batting her eyelashes.

“Woo!  Seductive.”

“Hey Holly,” said Sharky, turning Holly’s face back towards her with a brush of her hand against her cheek.  “Try like this.”  She drew in a puff of smoke, just filling her mouth, and nudged Holly’s open with her thumb on her lower lip, leaning in to slowly waft the smoke into her mouth with a kiss.  It took Holly a moment to understand what to do and a little smoke was lost, but she pulled it in with her heart pounding. 

“Oh, that’s your smoothest move,” Jay said, smiling.  “I do like that one.”  She kissed Holly’s bare shoulder.  “You should feel it soon.  Nice calm floaty feeling.”

“I think I have that a little already.”  She still wasn’t convinced she wasn’t convincing herself of  _ that, _ but at least it was a pleasant sensation.

“You know it makes sex feel better, right?”  Jay slipped her hand under the throw to stroke Holly’s tummy.  “And you know,” she added, nuzzling at her cheek, “when I talked about going to bed I really didn’t mean to sleep.”

Sharky gave a huge theatrical gasp.  “She’s trying to  _ seduce _ you, Holly.  You gonna let her?”

“She seduced me a few weeks ago and so did you.  Actually getting me into bed is a formality,” Holly pointed out, angling her head as Jay softly licked her neck.

“Yeah, is that even your preferred venue to get fucked?  No commuters, no graffiti… no getting  _ caught... _ ”  Sharky giggled and pulled Holly into a kiss, less smoky but with more eagerly stroking tongue.  Holly was caught between her and Jay, wishing she had a mouth for each of them.  Hands slid over her body and under the cotton wrapper, tugging it away, and Jay’s hand was between her legs, cupping over her mound, middle fingertip flicking lightly up and down to part her lips.  

“God, Holly, want you so much…” Jay moaned against her neck.  

“You’ve got me,” Holly gasped.  “Oh, you’ve got me.  Wait-wait-wait.”

“Mm?” Jay looked up at her, a little startled.  “Okay?”

“Let’s go to bed.  You two and me.  Yes.  Can we?”

“Sharky?” Jay asked.

“Fuck yes,” said Sharky, grinning.  “Mama wants, Mama gets.”

They bounded up and bundled her along to the bedroom, laughing breathlessly.  Sharky slammed the door to the bathroom before she had more than a glimpse of what was going on in there, although from the smell and sound of it, it involved a lot of her neroli and bergamot bath salts and the spa jets.  The bathers’ clothes were strewn all over the bed and Jay dislodged them by the simple method of lifting the quilt and snapping it in the air before throwing it back.  

“Okay,” Jay said, throwing her arms around Holly again, “I want this to be — you know like how I kissed you as soon as we got here, just  _ immediately _ rewarding?  Right?  I want this to be something that — you know, that —”

“Seals the deal?” suggested Sharky, with her shirt halfway off over her head.

“I don’t know, but…”  Jay slowed down a little, bringing her hands to Holly’s cheeks, stroking them lightly with her thumbs, looking into her face with wide dark eyes.  “I just want it to be great for you so you don’t ever wanna look back.  I want you to say hell  _ yes, _ this is what I want, this is the best fucking call I ever made.  Yeah?”

“Well, I  _ hope  _ so,” Holly said.  “You’re off to a pretty good start,” she added, “just confidentially.”

“How about me?” Sharky asked, wrapping her arms around Holly’s waist from behind and kissing just where the base of her head joined the nape of her neck.  “I mean, I brought the food.  Gotta count for something.”

“You are also off to an excellent start.  Not really because of the food.”  

“Hey, you liked it when I picked you up before, right?” Jay asked.

“I  _ loved _ it but I don’t want you to strain yourself — oop!”  Holly gave a startled little cry that rolled over into helpless giggling as Jay bent and scooped her up.

“Like a fuckin’ princess,” Jay said, smacked a kiss on her cheek, swung her round and dropped her on the bed.  She pulled her camisole off over her head and clambered on after her, on top of her, kissing her hungrily while trying to pull off her pyjama pants, eager and ungraceful.  She gave up and rolled off onto her back to yank them off, and while she did Sharky scrambled in with another lavish, wet kiss, pushing one thigh between Holly’s, worn denim feeling rough against her skin.  

“Take your clothes off,” Holly said, and then bit her lip because she wasn’t sure whether she  _ could _ tell Sharky what to do, it had been more of a  _ wish _ than an order, but Sharky was up and on her knees, pulling out a scrunchie and shaking out her hair, whipping off the infamous purple bra.  She held it up, her thumbs hooked through the shoulder straps, and made it dance in the air before spinning it around one forefinger and throwing it away.

“I was pretty sure you liked that first time you saw it,” she said, grinning.

“Of course I  _ liked _ it, I just… couldn’t  _ say _ I liked it yet.”  Holly tried to sit up, knowing she was staring at Sharky’s breasts but too addled with wine and arousal not to.  

“Yeah, I know, you were still deep in denial about your mad crush on me.  What’re you thinking, Miss Holly?  Whaddaya wanna do?”  Sharky walked her hands forward either side of Holly, laying her back again, arching over her so that her breasts hung level with Holly’s face.  “See, it’s okay to stare at my titties now.  They’re right here for you.  Also available for kissing, licking, su —  _ there  _ you go.”  She closed her eyes as Holly’s tongue touched her nipple before her lips closed on it.  “So good.  I knew you’d be good with your mouth.”

“I knew first,” said Jay smugly.  “And can I just tell you Holly worships pussy?  She doesn’t just eat, she  _ takes communion. _ ”  Holly found that a trifle embarrassing but on the whole complimentary.  She drew Sharky’s breast deeper into her mouth, stroking her tongue over the hard nipple and the silky areola, hoping that felt equally worshipful.  

“Oh, hold up, hold up, I need to get my pants off, I always wait till too late and then it breaks the flow.”  Sharky rolled away to the side of the bed, kicking off her shoes and unzipping her jeans at the same time.

“And while she’s doing  _ that _ I sneak in and steal you away,” said Jay, rolling Holly towards her and kissing her mischievously.  

_ “Such _ a bad girl,” Holly gasped.  

“You know it.”  Jay rolled on her back, carrying Holly with her, and planted both hands on her buttocks, fingers spread wide, grasping and rolling while she sucked Holly’s tongue.  

“C’mon, that’s not fair, share like they taught us in kindergarten,” Sharky begged.

“What kindergarten did  _ you _ go to?” Jay asked.  “Okay okay.  I’ll play nice.”  She kept her hold on Holly’s bottom while Holly sat up to put her arms around Sharky and kiss her apologetically.

“I know it’s normal to you but I’m  _ really _ not used to this kind of sharing,” she said, “so I may be, well, more horribly awkward than usual.”

“What’re you talking about?” Sharky asked.  “You get group groped on the regular.”

“Isn’t that different?”

Sharky shrugged one shoulder.  “Well, we’re wearing less and we’re somewhere a little more comfortable, so we can really go to town on you, but not  _ that _ different.  We wanna play with you together and make you feel good.”

“You should take it easy and we’ll take the lead,” said Jay, sitting up and nudging Holly into Sharky’s lap instead.  “Lemme help you off with those shoes before you  _ do _ rip the sheets.  These are some  _ really _ nice sheets.  Hella thread count, right?”  She undid the bows she’d tied and eased the high heels off Holly’s feet, dropping them beside the bed.

“And now we just enjoy you,” Sharky said, cupping and squeezing Holly’s breasts from behind.

“Just enjoy you,” Jay echoed, kissing her softly.  “Goes without saying we take requests.  Anything you want?”

“I don’t know what to say,” Holly admitted.  “What to ask.”

“Got any weird little fantasies you wanna try?”

“What we do on the train  _ is _ my weird little fantasy.”

“Good point,” said Sharky, chuckling.  “It  _ is _ pretty porno.”  

“Can I show you something I’ve been wanting to do, and just see if you wanna try it?” Jay asked eagerly.

“Of course.”

“Shit, where’d you leave my backpack?” Jay asked Sharky, who was quietly absorbed in rolling Holly’s nipples between her thumbs and forefingers.

“Relax, it’s in the living room, I dumped it by the couch.  Bring it all.”

“Two seconds, Holly,” Jay said, kissed her and rolled off the bed to scamper away.

“And while  _ she’s _ gone  _ I _ steal you,” Sharky declared, turning Holly round to face her and easing her down on her back with deep, wet kisses.  Holly wrapped her arms tight around Sharky’s shoulders and her legs around her hips and felt the heat of her against her body.  Sharky was perhaps a bit leaner than Jay, her curves a bit firmer, but they were still generous and the weight of her body made Holly feel very pleasantly pinned down.  She rocked her hips against Sharky’s lower belly and felt her shift to grind her mound against Holly’s, making her catch her breath and whimper.  “Can’t believe I’m getting to  _ do _ this,” Sharky breathed against her cheek.  “It’s been such a fuckin’ tease for so long.  Like a  _ courtship _ or something.”

“Oh yes, it’s been straight out of Jane Austen,” said Holly, and got the giggles.  “Oh shit, I’m sorry.”

“Nah, it’s cute when you’re giggly and jiggly,” Sharky said.  “I don’t think I ever heard you swear before.”

“Oh well, I’m always swearing in my head.  I’ve just learned to keep it in.”

“Seriously?  Let it out, holding in cusses gives you cancer and gas.”  She bent to stroke the side of Holly’s neck with the soft flat of her tongue.

“This just makes Jay’s point about you all corrupting me.”

“C’moooooon.  Say a dirty word.  Shock me.”

Holly pretended to think it over, rolling her eyes to one side and the other, and then stage-whispered “Fuck.”

“Oh my god,  _ Holly! _  For  _ shame!” _  Sharky tickled her, running wicked fingers from her waist up under her arms, and Holly shrieked before collapsing into irrepressible giggling.

“F-fuck,” she repeated when she could get enough air.  “Fuck, shit, hell, damn,  _ ass.” _

“We’re gonna fuck you right,” Sharky promised, “just like you’ve been needing,” and plunged into another long, greedy kiss.  Holly arched up to her, rolling her hips, feeling giddy with pleasure and excitement.

_ And I’m drunk, _ she thought, but that just seemed like an enhancement.  She heard a loud smack and felt Sharky’s body jolt before she rolled off her and called Jay an asshole.

“C’mon, your bubble butt bobbing around like that, what was I gonna do?” Jay asked, grinning.  She was carrying a small backpack by one shoulder strap and dumped its contents out onto the bed.  “This is my slutty go-bag,” she explained, “we got lube, we got wipes in case things get messy, we got dams and shit, but I’m a dumbass so I didn’t even ask yet, you got anything we need to be careful about?”

“No,” Holly said, startled; it seemed as obvious as the tattoos.  “Do, um, do you?”

“Nope!  All clear.  Trust, I would’ve said something before I let you go down on me.  Okay, got a couple of bullet vibes, got a rabbit, got the thing I really wanna show you.”  Jay bounced onto the bed and held up a purple dildo with a bulb at the back end.  “I’ve been thinking about fucking you with this since, ooh, maybe a week after I met you?”

“I can never get that thing to stay in unless I clamp my legs together,” Sharky said.  “It needs straps.”

“That’s ‘cuz you’re a lazy bitch who doesn’t do her Kegels,” Jay said cheerfully.  “You do ‘em, don’tcha Holly?”

“I don’t remember to,” Holly admitted.  She was still catching up to the idea that for some reason Jay had found her even remotely attractive when she’d still thought she and her friends hated her.

“Really?  I remember how hard you were squeezing on my fingers.  Maybe you’re just naturally strong.  Wanna give it a try?”

“Yes please.”

_ “Yes. _  Help me get it in?”  Jay’s face was so bright and eager, she somehow made fucking with a large purple dildo seem girlishly innocent.  She picked up the bottle of lube and drizzled a generous amount over the bulb end of it, rising on her knees with her legs astride.  Holly shuffled closer and slipped her fingers between Jay’s thighs, finding her labia sleek and hot.  She bit her lower lip in concentration, taking the dildo as Jay pressed it into her hand and bringing the smooth tip of the bulb into line.  “You just push the pony end right in there,” Jay breathed.

“Like this?”

“Just like that.  Fuck yes, that feels so good.”  Jay rocked her hips, bearing down, and grunted softly as it slipped in deep.  “That’s it.”  She reached to adjust it more comfortably  and bent her head to kiss Holly’s lips.  “So tell me I look good with a big purple dick,” she said with a crooked grin.

“You look wonderful,” Holly said earnestly.  “Beautiful.  What — how do you want me —”

“Lie back, baby, that’s right.”  Jay pressed her down on the pillows, one hand between her own legs steadying the dildo.  Beside her Sharky had picked up the bottle of lube, pumped some into her hand and reached between them to cover the shaft.

“You’re lucky I’m so helpful and a dirty voyeur,” she said, and turned her hand to stroke Holly’s pussy, adding to the wetness.  “Not that you need a lot of help,” she murmured.   _ “Someone’s _ ready to go.”

“You ready to go, Mama?” Jay purred.  “Or you wanna play around a little more first?”

_ I’m not going to tell her I’ve never done  _ exactly _ this unless something goes wrong and I have to, _ Holly decided.  She’d had plenty of experience with dildos and vibrators by herself, if not with any partner, and while her two somewhat perfunctory experiences with sex involving a penis had been first to see whether it made her feel anything in particular and second to confirm that it didn’t, because she was conscientious like that, they still counted as  _ experience. _  She’d passed job interviews with less.  “Ready to go,” she said.

“Help me put it in,” Jay breathed, edging forward, the tip of the dildo nudging Holly’s pussy, sliding up and down between the folds.  “Here we go.  That good?”

“Yes… oh yes…”  Pulling it in, she could feel the resistance of Jay gripping it inside her; she  _ was _ strong.  The muscles lining her own cunt twitched and yielded sweetly.

“If it ever hurts, you tell me and I’ll stop or back it off, just tell me, okay?  I don’t ever wanna hurt you.”  As it slid to its full depth inside her, Jay kissed her, sucking and tugging at her lower lip.  Holly caught her breath as Jay rolled her hips, their bodies pressed together, so warm and soft and enveloping, and for half a second she thought she was going to cry from sheer relief.   _That skin hunger thing._ She slid her hands up Jay’s back, clutching her tight, whimpering in her throat.  

“Still good?” Jay rested her forehead against Holly’s, her eyes hazy and tender.  Holly hummed urgently, pulling her back into a kiss, sucking her tongue as they rocked together.  Jay began a slow deep stroke that pushed a low moan out of her.  “Can you talk to me, Mama?  Tell me how it feels?”  Holly could only make little urgent sounds and kiss her feverishly.  “Yeah?  That good?  Keep going like this?  Okay.”  She thrust deeply, steadily, her breathing heavy but soft, her eyes on Holly’s face.  Holly drew up her legs either side of Jay’s body, finding the way she wanted to rock back against her, catching her breath in delight.

“Oh Jay,” she whispered.  “Oh, gorgeous girl…”  She felt a sweet little rush that ebbed again but left her higher than she had been.  “Oh yes!”  She was feeling ever giddier, light and warm, her heart pounding, with building surges of pleasure in the depths of her cunt where Jay was stroking so firmly.

“You gonna come for me as hard as you did for Skinny?”

“Harder.”

“Show-off,” said Jay, beaming, and kissed her, their mouths sliding wetly together as they pumped against each other, faster, sweating, Jay’s breasts resting on hers, all the glorious plump softness of her body pressing and bouncing against hers.  

She felt a little guilty about neglecting Sharky but she would just have to work out how to divide her attention between them properly another time; right now every bit of her focus was on the fiercely sweet feeling building between her and Jay that went on and on, deeper and deeper, until she was shuddering and gasping through an intense, pulsing orgasm that felt as if the sun was inside her.  As it faded in a rosy glow, Jay nuzzled at her nose and cheeks, murmuring softly.  

“You’re so beautiful when you come.  You’re really a queen, you know that, don’t you?”

“She’s a pillow princess,” said Sharky.  She leaned in from the side to kiss Holly’s cheek.  “But it  _ is _ really fun to see you getting off like that.”

“But I’m not… I mean…” Holly swallowed and wet her lips, a little dry from panting.  “That means someone who’s lazy and selfish in bed, right?”  Was that really what Sharky thought of her?  It almost killed the glow she was feeling.

“Naw, not exactly,” Jay said.  “You just like to relax and enjoy what you’re feeling, just focus on that and nothing else.  And we like to show you a good time.  You know that!”

“I didn’t mean it like a  _ bad _ thing,” Sharky said.  

“You got no tact, is your problem,” Jay said, slipping the dildo out of Holly and then out of herself.  She shook it at Sharky as if she was wagging a very large purple finger.

“Don’t point that thing at me,” Sharky laughed, swatting it away.

“I am  _ not _ lazy and selfish,” Holly said, pushing herself up on her arms.  “Let me show you.”

“I never said you were,” Sharky protested.  “That was you!  I happen to like the whole pillow princess thing.”

“I’m going to show you anyway,” Holly said, rolling her over and climbing on.


	4. Chapter 4

Holly had climbed astride Sharky full of bravado and determination but she was just slightly conscious of the fact she didn’t have much else up her sleeve.  

“What do you want?” she asked.  “How can I make  _ you _ feel really good?”

“Ummmm,” said Sharky, grabbing Holly’s hips and squeezing them thoughtfully.  “Kiss me while I think about it.”

Holly sank down into her arms, welcoming the opportunity to further explore Sharky’s wicked wet mouth and the strangeness of the barbell in her tongue.  She kept thinking she was going to do something wrong with it, but Sharky seemed to welcome her playing with it, twirling with her own tonguetip, while Sharky’s firm hands kneaded at her hips and her bottom as if their plump softness were the best thing she could possibly have got her hands on.

“Okay,” Sharky said breathlessly, pulling back from Holly’s lips and bumping noses with her, “okay, before we get any farther I gotta tell you I take a while to come, okay?  I’m not on a hair trigger like you, you lucky ho.  Just saying so you’re not gonna be thinking fuck, when’s something gonna happen?  Also gotta tell you your ass is like a marshmallow and I love it.”

“Oh,” said Holly, not really keeping up.  “Um.  Thank you!”

“Remember before?  You were sucking my titties?  Let’s get back into that, that was really damn good.”

“Yes!”   _ Oh thank goodness I know what to do.  How long does she mean by a while?  Twenty minutes, half an hour, an hour?  How can anyone stand it that long?   _ She shuffled back on her knees, moving down Sharky’s body to press her breasts together and kiss between them with a joyful smack.  Her nipples were smaller than Jay’s, darker and harder under Holly’s eager tongue, her areolae coming up in little goosebumps.  Sharky combed her fingers into Holly’s hair, stroking it back from her face, running her hand over the top of her head to cup behind it.  Her fingers tightened, gathering a loose handful of Holly’s hair at her nape, pulling it taut a moment before relaxing and stroking again.

Jay moved beside them, leaning up to kiss Sharky’s mouth before settling down to kiss the breast not presently occupying Holly.

“Oh, I get it in stereo?” Sharky asked.   _ “Very _ nice.  Sharky’s bitches treat her right.”  She yelped when Jay nipped her and then snorted with laughter.  “Maybe I deserved that.  But Holly’s being sweet to me.  Holly’s so soft and sweet… oh…”  She closed her eyes, sighing, and her fingers tightened again in Holly’s hair.  

_ Then I must be doing good.  Thank fuck the way I  _ want  _ to do this is good. _  She’d been surreptitiously afraid that there was something greedy or gross about the way she wanted to draw in as much of Sharky’s breast as possible, to fill her mouth and sweep her tongue over and around it, burrow her nose into its softness and breathe in the toasty smell of her skin.  She lingered over it, rewarded by progressively deeper sighs and groans.  There was a giddy feeling that everything she wanted and had tried to do without was finally  _ allowed.   _ Besides that, Jay was just beside her, sucking and humming softly, and the strange thing was how  _ companionable _ and  _ friendly _ it felt to do this together; there was the illicit thrill and then right alongside it a kind of cosiness that was practically wholesome.

She trailed her hand down over Sharky’s body, lingering over the soft swell of her lower tummy, and ventured to brush her fingers over her pubic hair, a thick crest down the middle of her mound with softer hair to either side.  Sharky’s hand covered hers, guiding it between her thighs to cup and hold her.  

“Holly?” Sharky murmured.  She looked up, reluctantly releasing the swollen nipple from her mouth.

“Yes?”

“Jay says you worship pussy.”

“If you  _ want _ me to…”

“Go to church, honey.”  She said it with a lazy, indulgent smile, spreading her legs in a smooth, firm motion, no hesitation.  A sharp eager whimper escaped from Holly and she scooted back down the bed, between Sharky’s thighs where her plump lips glistened and parted under Holly’s fingertips.  She had another piercing here, a gleaming barbell running vertically through the hood of her clitoris, set at the top with an amethyst like the stud in her cheek.   __

“It’s so  _ beautiful,” _ Holly said fervently.  “You know it is, don’t you?”

“That’s why I decorated it.  You know what to do, don’tcha?”

“She knows,” Jay said, giggling, and returned to kissing Sharky’s breast, pinching and rubbing the nipple of the other.  Sharky grunted softly and caught her breath, and she pressed on the back of Holly’s head, bringing her lips to her pussy.  Holly breathed in deeply, burying her nose in the crest of hair and drawing up her tongue in a soft, light stroke.

_ Each one has her own taste, just like her mouth.   _ Jay was more coppery, at least to begin with; she’d grown sweeter as she’d grown wetter.  Her first taste of Sharky was a little sour, a little sharp, but that gradually melted away under her tongue as she explored the outer folds of her pussy, enjoying how plump and cushiony the labia majora were, and ventured between the inner lips.  Even  _ knowing _ it was supposed to be normal to be a bit asymmetrical, she had always felt a bit embarrassed by how her left lip protruded over her right, but Sharky was the same,  _ the same, _ and that seemed exactly right.  She fluttered her tongue against their edges, playing with them, alternating between their softly creased outer sides and the sleek inner surfaces.

“Holy shit, her face is so cute,” Sharky whispered.

“I know, right?  She’s in Holly heaven.”  

“Holly-baby?”  Sharky’s fingers brushed her cheek.  “That feels so good.  I’ll love it even more if you rub my thighs too.  Oh, that’s it.”  She gasped as Holly’s tongue flicked her clitoris.  “Work it there, work it there.  You can play with the piercing.  Oh,  _ fuck,  _ Holly, that’s fuckin’ beautiful, keep going, keep  _ going.”   _ Holly felt her hips straining, pressing against her mouth, rising and falling as her buttocks tightened and relaxed.  She could roll the little metal bar under the delicate skin of the hood, she realised, working it against the shaft of the clitoris that was swelling and thickening.  When she’d begun there had been only the smallest dot of a candy-pink bud peeping from the darker hood and now it had come right out to meet her.   _ Like a little gumdrop.  Can I say that?  Is that a really weird, moment-ruining thing to say?  Just stop fretting and lick it, Holly.  Oh my God, is this what it feels like to be in your element?  It is, isn’t it? _

She settled in with a feeling of vast contentment, hands steadily kneading Sharky’s inner thighs where a pillow of soft fat covered a taut cable of muscle, just as steadily massaging that swelling gumdrop, occasionally varying her stroke by sliding down and dipping into the well of Sharky’s pussy, finding her softer and more open each time, praising her with whispered profanities when she pushed her tongue deeper. 

“Put your fingers inside me,” Sharky moaned, “that’s it, that’s right, go deep.  Fuck me right.”  As Holly stroked her slick inner walls she tightened them on her fingers, gripping tight enough to stop them moving until she released them with a sigh.  “See, Jay?  I’ll do my Kegels if Holly helps.  You’ll help, right Holly?”

“Every day,” Holly said earnestly before busying her tongue again.

“Gonna hold you to that now.  Personal pussy trainer,” she said, giggling.  “New career.  Oh!”  She pushed up to Holly’s tongue, trembling.  “Keep it up, baby, keep it up, this is…  _ fuck.” _

“This is fuck,” repeated Jay, with a bubble of laughter in her voice.

“This  _ is _ fuck!”  Sharky’s fingers rumpled through Holly’s hair, stroking urgently, coaxing her on.  She sealed her lips around her clitoris and sucked softly, trying to gradually increase the tension.   _ I wonder how long it’s been?  She wasn’t joking about needing time.  I know she’s happy, I can feel she’s happy, but what if I can’t get her there?  No, I can do it, I can do it.  She deserves it, this lovely girl deserves it.   _ She pressed on with new enthusiasm, churning her tongue, pumping her fingers, moving Sharky to sharp little squeaks of ecstasy but  _ still,  _ it seemed, no nearer an orgasm, while her jaw was threatening to ache.   _ I’m smarter than this.  When I remember to be. _

She sat up, holding up one finger.  “Jus’ — just a moment.”

“You want me to spell you?” Jay asked.  “You’ve been down there a while.”

“No, just — just wait right there.”  Holly clambered down from the bed, knelt and rummaged in the cabinet under her nightstand, digging out the Bodywand.  She was still in two minds about showing them quite how  _ much _ equipment she had in there but this felt like a very safe choice.  She plugged it into the power strip on the floor and climbed back up.

“Whoa!  Power tools,” said Sharky.  “Bring it on.”

“It’s a  _ skosh  _ noisy,” Holly said, thumbing the dial.  It whirred into life and they both burst into startled laughter.

“I’ve seen them in videos but fuck, it’s louder in person!” Jay exclaimed.

Sharky gasped as Holly drew the buzzing head down over her mound to nudge above her clitoris.  “Holy fuck, that’s strong!”

“Too much?” Holly asked.  “It’s a low setting but I can turn it down a bit more.”

“No, it’s great, it’s — here, bring it like this?  Oh my god!”  She kept giggling in apparent disbelief until the giggles got lost between accelerating grunts and moans, culminating in a shuddering cry and a hot clear gush of liquid that soaked the powder-blue sheet under her.  Sharky’s head fell back on the pillow, her limbs went limp and the only sound she made was hoarse deep breathing as Holly gradually slowed the speed of the vibrator and brought it to a stop.

“Good?” she asked hopefully.  Sharky made a vague shaky-handed gesture and moaned weakly.

“We need to try that from a standing start sometime,” said Jay, “‘cuz I think you just found a  _ dramatic _ increase in Sharky-fucking efficiency.”  Sharky swatted her breast with the back of her hand.  “Hey, I’ve logged the hours to be allowed to give you shit.”

“‘strue,” Sharky said, pushing herself up on her elbows and lifting her head to give Holly a giddy smile.  “Sorry ‘bout your bed.  Shoulda prob’ly put a towel down.”

“It doesn’t matter,” Holly said, glowing with achievement, “I have a waterproof mattress cover.  You can be just as messy and wet and squirty as you want.”

“Okay, I thought vibes didn’t work too well on me, but I wanna change that to janky cheap AA battery vibes don’t work too well on me.  Turns out plug-in vibes that sound like a belt sander are the business.”  She began to giggle again, flopping back on the bed.

“Aw, you done it now, you fucked her silly,” Jay said fondly.  She sat up and threw her arms around Holly, pulling her close for a kiss.  “Who’s fantastic?”

“Is it me?” Holly asked, and gave a little gleeful shriek as Jay wrestled her down.

 

Holly had always been a bit uncomfortable with that whole cliché of someone waking up in bed beside someone they’d presumably had sex with and not being able to remember anything about it.  It had never happened to her yet — not that she had had  _ many _ one night stands and she had usually gathered her things and gone home in a hurry, wanting to sleep in her own bed — and it was a relief to her that as she woke up, although she felt initially confused about why she wasn’t alone, once the fog cleared a little she had no problem remembering.  

The fog didn’t clear entirely.  The fog consisted of the nastiest hangover she had had in years.  Her mouth was dry and sticky, her eyes felt as if they had been sprinkled with sand and her head both ached and felt numb, which should have been impossible.  Her stomach felt frankly disgusting.  It was completely and totally her own fault.  After ringing Sharky’s bell, a feat of which she’d felt disproportionately proud, she had been so over-excited she’d gone and dug out a bottle of champagne that she had been given a few months ago and that had been lurking in the back of the fridge awaiting an occasion she could count as special ever since.  There was a little bit of an oenophile in Holly that was honestly ashamed of swigging Veuve Clicquot from the bottle (and letting Sharky pour it over her breasts and suck it off) but she was generally unrepentant.  There had been more drinking, more dancing, a  _ little _ more smoke but not very much because they ran out and everyone was too drunk, silly and undressed to go out for more.  

There had been a midnight bath and a lot of frantic running around dropping towels on puddles from the overflow when Gigi climbed in on top of her.  There had been a detailed demonstration of the massage settings on the showerhead, partly because the pillow princess accusation still rankled a tiny bit and it had started to seem like part of her  _ hospitality _ and duty as a hostess to give her guests pleasure, and when someone had popped her head in from the bedroom and asked her for lube she had unthinkingly said, “Check the nightstand,” meaning the drawer, but they had opened the cupboard under it and then there had been whoops of glee when her entire sex toy collection had been discovered.  She’d had a few moment’s awful bewildered shame, thinking they were making fun of her, that it was pathetic for her to have so  _ many _ , and then their enthusiasm had washed it away.  Holly’s power tools, as everyone ended up calling them, had been shared around with gay abandon and would all need thorough cleaning and recharging, she supposed.  She could hear a low monotonous growl that suggested the Bodywand was still plugged in and hadn’t been turned off before everyone passed out.

She couldn’t actually remember settling down to go to sleep herself.  The last thing she thought she clearly remembered was belligerently insisting that she could do French braids no matter how drunk she was.  Based on the head of hair just in front of her, allowing for some rumpling from the pillow, she had actually been right.  That was Chip, she thought, and looking down a little and seeing the intricately tattooed back and arm belonging to the head confirmed it.  In more or less the same place on the arm where Jay had her enneagram, Chip had a dark red berry.  

Strawberry?  No, raspberry.  It nestled in a little cluster of leaves in amongst the vines and snakes, ripe and perfect.  If she hadn’t felt so queasy it would have been appetising; she might have wanted to lean over and lick it.  And she had absolutely no problem remembering nuzzling in between Chip’s thighs at some stage in the revelry and licking her soft wet lips and playing, with her tongue, with the firm little bump of her clitoris, flushed red with arousal — not quite as red as a raspberry but now she’d got the two of them linked in her mind and she wasn’t sure she could unlink them.  Raspberries and gumdrops and all kinds of other sweet juicy things.

_ A beautifully illustrated girl is lying in my bed just in front of me, and just behind me is another with her arm around my waist.   _ She didn’t need to see her, even her hand cupping her tummy, to know it was Jay from the way she felt, and the more she thought about that, the fact that now she recognised the  _ feeling _ of Jay naked against her so clearly, the more her eyes prickled with incipient tears.  On the other hand, she couldn’t get too sentimental because her bladder was bursting with incipient pee and she was going to have to try to get out of bed without waking everyone else up or wetting herself.  There was someone else slung across the foot of the bed and goodness knew where the other nine were. 

Trying to move also brought to her attention the fact that she had managed to fall asleep with a buttplug in.  You really could get used to anything, at least if you were drunk and tired enough.  It wasn’t very large but it was certainly noticeable and she could also very clearly recall that Sharky’s enthusiasm for playing with her ass had been a mixture of bewildering, flattering, exciting and a little bit painful at some points.  She’d begged off from trying to cram in a dildo but yes, the buttplug had been a success.  

Moving very carefully, pausing when it felt as if her brain was sloshing around inside her head, she disentangled herself from her bedfellows and clambered over Jay without waking her to pad barefoot into the bathroom.  Skinny and Carnie were asleep in the empty tub, curled up together with towels for blankets, Carnie hugging her loofah like a teddy bear.  Thanking her stars that the toilet was in a separate little room at the back, she slipped in and closed the door and achieved the blessed relief of peeing more or less forever.

Removing the buttplug was not  _ easy _ but nothing like as bad as it could have been in her squeamish state; Sharky had put a condom over it so she could just crumple that in toilet paper and flush it away and not have to contemplate cleaning the plug itself.  She wrapped another square of paper around it, set it on the floor and sat down again with her head in her hands.  Why was there a sneaker on the floor in here?  Who took off one shoe in the toilet?  It looked like one of Jay’s; she thought she remembered those silver shoelaces.  

She reached out one of her own feet and dragged it closer before risking bending down to pick it up.  Her head still swum but everything was just a little better now she was no longer at risk of bursting.  The sole was too worn for any marking to be legible but by peering at the insole she could make out a faded figure 9.  She mentally converted from European sizes and yes, that would make Jay’s feet at least half a size too big for her own shoes.   _ Mental note.  Jay wears a size 9 US, probably a 40 European.  And the soles on these are thin and there are holes rubbed in the lining, she  _ needs _ a new pair.  It’ll be fun to surprise her.   _ She felt generous just thinking about it.

There was a champagne flute standing on the vanity with about half an inch of orange soda in it, so after washing her hands she rinsed it out and drank four flutes of cold tap water to at least start to put a dent in her dehydration before getting into the shower.   _ I really want one of those IVs full of saline and B vitamins like the fabulous people have.  Oh God, that feels so much better.   _ She was just standing dumbly letting the water drum on top of her head like heavy rain when the glass door opened and an arm went around her waist as Jay let herself in.  She hugged Holly from behind, resting her cheek on the back of her head.

“Morning, Mama,” she mumbled.

“Good morning,” Holly said, trying not to show how startled she had been.  She hadn’t shared a shower since — actually, she didn’t think she’d ever shared a shower, not one-to-one like this.  The girls’ gym showers at school had been a place to hurry through without getting caught looking or being seen too much herself.

“I feel like shit run over twice, but last night was  _ awesome,” _ Jay said.  “No regrets, right?”

“My brain and the lining of my stomach regret everything.  The rest of me is fine.  Um — would you like me to wash your back?”

“Was gonna ask if I could wash your hair.  Take turns?”

“All right.”

She hadn't really been prepared for how it would affect her to feel Jay taking  _ care _ of her in this way.  It was another moment when tears of relief welled up, but this time at least she was facing away and could be expected to have water on her face anyway.  She didn't want to have to explain her weepiness; it would look pitiful or even a bit unhinged.  There was just such  _ kindness  _ in Jay's hands touching her, with no aspect of the embarrassment she always felt over responding emotionally to touches that she only received because she'd paid for them, like having a massage or her hair being washed at a salon.  The touch was being given to her free because Jay  _ wanted  _ to touch her, not only in desire but in kindness, and that made her feel pathetically grateful.  It felt almost motherly but better, because she didn't think she was disappointing Jay yet. 

_ God, you're a weird little thing,  _ she told herself and wiped warm water over her face.  

There was only one dry towel left on the shelf so they shared it, talking to each other in whispers.  The sleepers in the bath and for that matter the bedroom seemed impervious to shower noise. 

“We could be heroes,” Jay whispered, “and go out and get everyone coffee.”

“And something to eat,” Holly whispered back, “because I don't think I can even offer everyone a slice of toast.”

“I found my other shoe and I'm pretty sure my top and jacket are still in the kitchen but I got no idea where the rest of my clothes are,” Jay whispered. 

“I’ll lend you some things, don't worry.”

“I wasn't worried.”  Jay smiled and kissed her cheek. 

Tiptoeing around and sliding drawers as silently as she could, Holly gave her socks and underpants and yoga pants, the latter quite frankly because she looked forward to seeing her curvaceous ass in them.  She pulled on sweatpants and an old college sweatshirt, because attempting anything more co-ordinated or civilised was beyond her right now, tied her hair in a ponytail, tucked her wallet, keys and phone into her pockets and crept out to the kitchen where Jay was just putting on her jacket.  She flipped her damp hair out over its collar and gave Holly a radiant smile.  

_ She's seeing me hungover on a Sunday morning, with no make-up and wet hair, probably looking like a drowned albino rat and dressed like a depressive making an ice cream and Advil run, and she's still looking at me like that.  It doesn't make sense at all.  Oh my goodness.  I don't think she found her bra.  I'm going to have problems if I can't refrain from staring at the way her breasts move around under a loose teeshirt.   _

“C’mon,” Jay said.  As she closed the apartment door behind her and gave her habitual tug to make sure the latch had clicked and the lock turned, Holly realised she was leaving all the people whose probity with regard to her valuables she'd doubted last night entirely alone and unsupervised in her home.  Could you even make an insurance claim if people ripped you off under those circumstances?  For a moment her mind provided a dismally vivid preview of the contemptuous police officer she would have to explain herself to, and she knew she would just have to swallow the loss.  

_ But do I really think they would?  I'm anxious but I think it's more habit than a genuine, specific worry.   _

_ The question is whether I think they're silly enough to kill the golden goose,  _ said the nasty cynical but possibly sensible quarter of her mind.  

“Earth to Holly,” said Jay, waving a hand in front of her face.  “Elevator’s here.”

“Oh.  Oh, sorry, I’d spaced out for a moment.”  She shook her head, regretted it and followed Jay into the elevator.  

“So, um,” said Jay, darting a sideways glance at her as they turned to face the closing doors, “I know this might sound like a weird question from someone who had a finger up your ass last night, but you want to hold hands?”  She held out her hand and Holly stared at it, too surprised to react.  Jay followed her gaze, misinterpreted it and said quickly, “You know I’ve washed my hands since then!”

Holly clapped her own hand over her mouth too late to effectively smother the blurt of embarrassed laughter.  Jay blinked, caught on and began to laugh too, the two of them leaning together helplessly.  The elevator chimed for the lobby and the doors opened and they ignored them.  

“Oh man.  Okay,” said Jay, wiping her eyes on her sleeve.  “I just meant, I dunno, how do you feel about going around in public, like  _ brazenly  _ holding hands?  I just wanna be sure you feel safe.”

“I would be  _ proud  _ to hold your hand,” Holly said, reaching for it and feeling it wrap warm around her own.  Having said that, it still helped that the streets of her neighbourhood were relatively quiet at this time on a Sunday.  When you decided to be bold and show who you were to the world it was nice not to feel the  _ whole _ world was looking at once.  She felt childishly thrilled.   _ She wants to hold my hand too.  She wants to do silly innocent things like this.   _ The spring sunshine was pale and watery but there was a flowering cherry tree in a tub on a neighbouring building’s front stoop that looked like how she felt.  

“I’m glad I met you in spring,” she said, taking a chance on sounding twitterpated.  “It feels appropriate.”

“Wasn't it more like late winter?” Jay asked.  “I’m pretty sure I noticed you… maybe end of February?”

“No, that can't be right, that was before we ever spoke and I know that was near the end of March.”  She wished she could send a message back to the furious, embarrassed, bewildered Holly of March to let her know things were going to turn out better than she had the faintest reason to expect.  

“Yeah, I  _ noticed  _ you a long time before then, and  _ I  _ know ‘cuz that's when we started taking that train.  You were the hot snobby lady giving us the evil eye when you knew we could see you and checking us out when you thought we couldn't.”  She grinned at Holly and gave her hand a little pull to keep her moving.  

“Why  _ did  _ you start taking that train?” Holly asked, trying to cover her confusion.  “Where do you all have to be at that time of day?”

“School,” said Jay.  

“You’re in college?” Holly asked, startled all over again.  Apart from anything else none of them had ever mentioned a class or a professor and it was hard to imagine students who never talked about those, at least to complain.  

“Ha, nah, we help with the free breakfast programme at an elementary school.  They need volunteers but most of the parents can't do it, I mean, the reason they're dropping their kids at school before breakfast is they gotta get to work.  So we go and we get the food ready and we serve it up and talk to ‘em and sometimes we help if they’ve got homework to finish or whatever.  Then we clean up.”

“Why are you doing  _ that?” _  Holly asked.  Did they have  _ children  _ at the school?  But surely people with children talked about them even more than college students talked about their classes.  None of them  _ looked  _ as if she'd had a baby and Holly had had a pretty good look by now.  Maybe she was more naïve to assume  _ none  _ of them would be a mother.  Did  _ Jay _ have a child old enough to be in school?

“Heard about it at the Y,” said Jay.  “Some of us coach some little girls’ basketball there so they could vouch for us.  You don't want just any old delinquents working with kids, right?” she added with a sly glance that made Holly feel she'd been seen through.  

“No, I, um, I think it's commendable, it's really wonderful that you’re doing that, that you're giving up your own mornings to give a good breakfast to children whose own parents don't take that much care of them,” she stammered.  

Jay stopped walking and stared at her. “Did you not hear the part where those kids’ parents have gotta work?  They're doing their best.  And we're talking the shitty jobs where you take whatever hours they’ll give you and the pay sucks anyway.  And because the kids get the free breakfast and lunch at school, they can have dinner at home, you get it?  Have you ever had to decide which meal  _ you're  _ gonna skip so your kid can eat?”

“I — I don't have a kid,” Holly faltered.  Her face felt  _ burnt _ with shame and anger that Jay was making her  _ feel _ ashamed, and her stomach was frozen by the fear that she had just clumsily ruined absolutely every bit of the happiness she had stumbled into equally clumsily.  She was terrified to say anything but knew she had to find the right thing to say to fix this and she had disappointed Jay already and she should have known and it wasn't fair and she felt more than ever as if she might vomit up the remains of last night's excess.  

Jay gave her an appraising look.  “But I can give you a pass on that once because I bet you weren't raised right,” she said.  Holly's mouth dropped open in stunned indignation.  “I don't think rich white people teach their kids  _ any _ values except for money,” Jay went on.  “When you're doing okay, you do what you can for someone who isn't doing so good.  Even rats know that.  Like literally rats.  They did a study.”

_ How can you be so self-righteous?  Are you calling my family lower than  _ rats?   _ Ha! You should meet Aunt Honey.  Fuck Aunt Honey, I hate Aunt Honey, she always made me get frozen yoghurt when she took me and Iris out for ice cream.  I think I’m going insane.   _

But Jay was still holding her hand. 

“I’m sorry,” Holly said, so she wouldn't let go.  She wanted to argue her point, was sure she could back it up if she could just think clearly for a moment, but she couldn't because she was so terrified Jay would just leave her there, never miss her, and it would be winter again forever.  

“Okay,” Jay said.  “You still want to get that coffee?”

“Yes,” Holly said, and swallowed hard.  “You — you meant it about giving me a pass?”

“Wouldn't say it if I didn't mean it.” Jay's face softened.  “C’mon, Holly, don't look so freaked out.  You think I’m just gonna stop liking you like that?”  She snapped the fingers of her free hand.  

“I don't know why you  _ started  _ liking me in the first place,” Holly admitted.  “The first time I ever spoke to you was to insult you.”

Jay laughed.  “Aw, that was funny!  That was our meet-cute like in the movies.”  She started walking again, towing Holly with her.  “Okay, I didn't really like you at first.  You pissed me off so I thought it'd be funny to mess with you.  We all did.  You know you were trying so hard to act like you were above us, and  _ we  _ knew you were into us.  And then there was that time we all got thrown off the train and you looked like you were gonna  _ cry _ and I was like holy shit, I think I want to  _ protect _ her.  Which way?”

“What?” Holly asked.  They had stopped on a street corner.

“Which way?  I mean, you were leading.  Where’s Starbucks or whatever?”

“Oh!  This way.”   _ Starbucks, ew, _ she thought, but decided that wasn’t a wise thought to share right now.  It would be nicer just to focus on sharing  _ her _ favourite coffee place with Jay, the one where she always fuelled up in the morning.  “But… then I suppose I ruined that by being ungrateful when you got me to work on time anyway.”

“Eh, you were panicking.  We weren’t thrilled, but I get you a little better now.  And then you gave us that crazy generous thank-you present, and it just felt like everything warmed up a bit, didn’t it?  You were still pretty snotty and snooty, but you were always watching us, wanting to be part of what we’ve got, right?  And we wanted to let you in.  Plus by that time we had a  _ massive _ group ladyboner for you.”  Jay gave her another of those sidelong glances, and Holly thought she saw a hint of shyness, of all things.  “And then, do you remember when we came back from the music fest and you were all ‘where have you been?  I was worried sick!’”

“I never said I was worried sick.  I  _ was. _  But I certainly didn’t say it.”

“I was so happy.  Knowing you missed us, knowing… it started out as a joke.  We were messing with you.  I didn’t know I was gonna end up dippy about you, but here we are.  And while we were away, I was thinking about you and missing you, and we were joking around like, ‘who’s gonna feel up Miss Duchess when we’re not there?  She’ll have to hump one of the poles.’  And every now and then someone’d say, ‘shit, I actually miss her, I was just wondering what she’s doing today, you think she’s thinking about us?’ __ And Amy — we were crashing with Ella’s little sis Amy, she lives in a barn with her nerd wife and a bunch of Roombas that might be alive — said ‘who the fuck is this woman, ‘cuz you’re all obsessed with her?’  And we had to admit we didn’t know your name yet!  So they gave us gentle shit about that for hours.”  Jay shook her head reminiscently.  “So when we got back and I knew you missed us, I was like aw yeah, this is happening.  It’s all on.”

“In recognition of which you  _ finally _ asked me my name?”

“Yeah, well, Miss Manners I ain’t.”  Jay swung their joined hands between them.  “I only found out your  _ last _ name from your buzzer button.  I thought Agate was a rock or a crystal or something.”

“It is.  There are more people with gemstone names than you’d think.  Well, my employer’s name really is Diamond.  Jack  _ Ruby _ shot Lee Harvey Oswald.  I had a teacher called Mrs Emerald.”

“Does Billy Crystal count?”

“He does.”

“My last name is Prime.”

“That’s an unusual name.  It’s a good name!” Holly added hastily.  

“Yep.  I never have to worry about getting old ‘cuz I’ll always be in my Prime.”  Jay winked at her.  “Plus sometimes when little kids hear my name they ask if I know Optimus and I say ‘oh yeah, he’s my uncle.’  And they say ‘but he’s a robot and you’re not.’  And I say ‘yeah, lots of families are mixed, right?’  And they say ‘oh yeah,’ and they just roll with it.  They’re the ones who asked me if I know a robot from space because my name sounds like his.  I fuckin’ love kids.”

“I never know how to talk to children,” Holly admitted.  

“How did you like grown-ups to talk to  _ you _ when you were a kid?”

“I didn’t like them to talk to me, I was shy.”

“What’d you like when you were a kid?  I’m trying to get a picture.”

_ Try short, fat and mousy. _  “Books.  Especially about talking animals or tiny people, like the Borrowers.  My Little Pony.  The first time it was popular.”

“I liked soccer and basketball and pro wrestling and Disney princesses.”

“One of those things is not like the others.”

“It kind of is if you assume you’re talking about a baby lesbian who has a big crush on Princess Jasmine.”

_ I look nothing like Princess Jasmine,  _ Holly thought idiotically.  

“This is kind of like that, right?” Jay asked her.  “Me the street rat, you the princess?  Subway car for a magic carpet?  I’m really stretching it here.”

“I’m really,  _ really _ not like a princess,” Holly said, shaking her head.  “I mean, look at me.”

“Yeah.  You look better.  One, you’re real and I can touch you.  Two, you weren’t designed by someone who thinks a girl’s waist should be just a little thicker than her neck.  I mean, no offence to skinny girls, but ain't nobody built like that.”

“Well, be that as it may, we're here,” Holly pointed out.  The coffee shop stood on a street corner decorated with a curved awning, glossy chocolate brown with the name Solace in matte gold.  She experienced another moment of nerves, or maybe cowardice, as they went through the door.  She was known here, a regular weekday morning customer, and they had only ever seen her with her face on and her hair done, smartly dressed and not hand in hand with anyone, much less a beautiful but very scruffy girl with candy-coloured hair.  What were they going to think?  Maybe they wouldn't even recognise her.

She realised, though, that in fact she didn't recognise the young man behind the counter.  Perhaps he was brand new or he only worked on weekends.  Either way he was a stranger and the relief was real.  She still avoided any sustained eye contact but stepped up to the counter and gave her order like a rational being.  She asked for caffè mocha with a double shot of espresso; that seemed strong enough under the circumstances. 

“And you?” she asked Jay, who surprised her by reeling off not only her own order (an iced frappé thing with whipped cream and caramel, more of a milkshake than a coffee) but eleven more in detail.  She hadn't had a chance to ask the others, since they had all been strewn about the bedroom and living room floor in various attitudes of slumber, so evidently everyone’s favourite morning coffee was just information she carried in her head at all times.   _ I’ve got to learn that,  _ Holly thought.   _ That and everyone’s shoe size.   _

They more or less cleared out the display case of crullers and croissants, and as they stood waiting for all the cups to be stacked into cardboard trays, Jay stepped behind Holly and stood hugging her from behind, arms around her waist, resting her chin on her shoulder.  Holly found this simultaneously delightful and deeply embarrassing.  

It wasn't as if anyone was actually staring at them, it wasn't as if Jay was doing anything outrageous or even particularly conspicuous, but having her close behind her, their bodies brushing together, her arms around her, inevitably and irresistibly evoked the magic circle.  Her pussy was slightly tender this morning and she felt it blooming again with just a gentle trickle of wetness.   _ Oh really.  Already?  You’re ridiculous. _  She bit her lip trying not to grin.

With a tray of six cups each, Jay cradling the bag of pastries in her free arm and Holly gratefully consuming her own coffee as fast as the heat of the liquid allowed, they began the walk back.

“I need to learn all of those,” Holly said, nodding at the trays.  “I’ve never been much good at memorising lists, though.”

“Yeah, I have to put things together with pictures in my head,” Jay said.  “Like Carnie always wants a plain Americano, so I picture her drinking coffee wrapped in the Stars and Stripes.”

“I don’t suppose there are any that are easy to remember like Skinny wanting a skinny latte?”

“Nope, she wants cappuccino with cinnamon so I picture her wearing a cap and chinos doing the cinnamon challenge.”  She lifted her tray to take a sip from the straw stuck in her own drink.

“What’s that?”

“Something too dumb for a classy lady like you to know about,” Jay said.  “Chip always wants hot chocolate, so that’s easy, chocolate Chip, right?”

“Thank goodness for Chip.”

“She’s great, isn’t she?  I mean, I think they’re all great.  I love my girls so much.  I wish I’d known growing up you could even  _ have _ a set-up like this.  At least I did know two girls could love each other and that’s okay.  My Nana put me right on that when I asked her if it would be bad if the princess in a fairy tale wanted to marry  _ another _ princess.”

“That’s so sweet.  Did she really?”

“Yep!  She said ‘of course not, baby, loving someone is always a good thing.  Don’t even worry about it.’  So all my Barbies got gay married.  But they also got divorced and swapped around a lot, because little me loved the dramz.  Or at least the dramz she thought you had to have if someone loved more than one person.  When I have kids I’m going to try and tell ‘em more about the whole range of what’s possible.  You know, when I think they can understand.”

_ “When _ you have kids?” Holly asked, not sure what that implied.

“Yeah, that’s part of the free-form floating life plan where I don’t know exactly when or how or with who, I just know I’m definitely gonna have kids.  How ‘boutchu?”

“This is too deep of a conversation to have before I’ve metabolised my coffee,” Holly said, trying to laugh carelessly.  She was honestly alarmed by how fast her thoughts were racing on to “But you can’t do that with me, so you’re going to leave me, aren’t you?”  That was just crazy talk.  Jay was young and footloose and when she talked about having kids one day she was probably imagining five or even ten years in her future, and it was natural to assume that a fling like this would be over by then, and she, Holly, was borrowing trouble by dwelling on how she would feel when that happened.  Better by far to concentrate on the present time and enjoy it as much as she possibly could.  Springtime, sunshine, gradual caffeine-assisted revivification, lovely girl beside her.

“Haha, yeah!”  Jay shook her head ruefully.  “Didn’t mean to get all D&M on you first thing.  Let’s just go enjoy being the heroes.”

They were received not so much with rapture as with sincere gratitude and a lot of groaning.  Everyone gradually came to life and sat around the living room half dressed, squinting against the light and wordlessly chewing.

“What time is it?” Skinny asked after a while.

“Ten thirty,” said Holly.  She had been startled and then quietly pleased to be pulled to sit leaning against Sharky with one arm around her shoulders.  “We woke up early considering.”

“Ugh.  Okay.  At least my shift doesn’t start till noon.”

“I’m already late,” said Gigi.  “I’ll try phoning in and saying I have stomach flu and I was puking too hard to call before, but I don’t like my chances.”

“You hate that place anyway,” said Skinny.  “You said you keep getting asked for happy endings and your boss won’t back you up when you tell them to fuck off, just says you must be giving out the wrong signals if you’re getting asked.”  She snorted.  “Asshole.”

“I know, but till I save up for a portable table I gotta work somewhere.”

“Portable table?” Holly asked hesitantly.

“Massage table,” Gigi clarified, reaching for another croissant.  “Or just a chair.  The chairs are good for office work, you can go in and give ten-minute back-rubs, get a weekly booking.”  She gave Holly a wink.  “Don’t tell me you didn’t notice my magic fingers.”

“Oh!  We have someone who comes and does that at our office,” Holly exclaimed.  “Not the finger part,” she added hastily, although that had been a definite highlight of their bath together.

“Well, if you lose ‘em hit me up,” said Gigi.  “And  _ you _ I would give a happy ending.  Free for a friend.”  She paused.  “Actually, real talk, if you could recommend me to anyone it could be a big help.  If I gave you some cards?”

“Of course,” Holly said, a little surprised to be asked, but no one else seemed to take it as unusual.  Well, any opportunity to network.  “I don’t know how much opportunity I’ll have, but I’ll try.”

“Cool.  Thanks, Mama,” Gigi said, giving her a smile that a hangover and her general rumpled-up appearance couldn’t dim.

Holly’s face felt warm.  “Is  _ everyone _ calling me that now?” she asked.

“You’re the sugar mama,” said Sharky, kissing her cheek and giving her a friendly one-handed boob-squeeze.

“When you pass that basket,” Gigi sang, “folks contribute to, you put in for Mama…”

“She’ll put out for you,” they sang in ragged harmony, and all burst into laughter.

“Give us a verse, Holly,” said Chip.

“I — I can’t sing.”

“Neither can we!”  That was nonsense, they had good voices even if they were roughened by fatigue and cruller crumbs.

“C’mooooon.”

They were all eager, encouraging smiles, and she couldn’t claim now that she didn’t  _ know _ the song.  She cleared her throat and sang, with an uncertain wobble in her voice, “They say that life is tit for tat, and that’s the way I live…”

A chorus of “whoo!”s went up.

“So I deserve a lot of tat for what I’ve got to give,” she finished in a hurry and turned to hide her face in Sharky’s shoulder while the crowd went wild.

Gradually they cleaned themselves up and, in twos and threes, trailed out to face the day, kissing her goodbye, thanking her for everything.  Sharky and Jay were the last to go and they stood for a long while by the door hugging her between them, gently swaying.  

“This is the start of something great,” Jay said quietly.

When they were gone she turned and looked at the wreckage.  There were food wrappers and empty paper cups  and bottles and cans strewn all over the living room and kitchen.  She’d seen the bathroom.  The bedroom was probably actually the least destroyed part and as far as she knew no one had even gone into her study.  She should start cleaning up in here, get the worst done first.  The maid would be in on Monday but that was no reason to leave her such an excessive mess to deal with.

In the end she just took off her bra and lay down on the bed and slept until four in the afternoon.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Oh boy, this took a long time, but Holly got to eat a lot of pussy and be a big ol' snob but not ruin everything.
> 
> Relevant study of empathy and altruism in rats:  
> [https://www.scientificamerican.com/article/jailbreak-rat/ ](https://www.scientificamerican.com/article/jailbreak-rat)
> 
> There are in fact [at least four hundred people in the US with the family name Agate](http://www.americanlastnames.us/A/AGATE.html%20) (which is a variant of the more common English location-surname Atgate) and [over ten thousand with the last name Prime.](http://www.americanlastnames.us/P/PRIME.html%20) All of them are related to Optimus.


	5. Chapter 5

Holly was honestly ashamed to do it but she left nearly all of the mess for the maid.  At least she’d cleared up all the food garbage in the evening, two big plastic sacks of it that she left by the door, and she put away the sex toys and washed the sheets and towels and made her bed with fresh ones, but then she got distracted texting back and forth with the girls, and shopping online for sneakers for Jay and researching what was supposed to be a good brand and a reasonable price for a portable massage table or chair (and also considering that if Gigi was hoping to go into business for herself and offer a mobile service she could really use one of those attachments that let you take credit card payments on a smartphone), and before she knew it, it was late.  

_ Then _ she had woken up at three in the morning because her sleep cycle was all out of whack, couldn’t sleep again until five and woke up late, confused and disgruntled.  She left a note on the kitchen counter, “Good morning!  I’m so sorry about the extra mess (I had a small party this weekend).  This is for the extra trouble,” and weighed down the last fifty from her wallet with a lemon.  She had to race out the door; there was no time to get coffee on the way, although she needed it more than usual.  She would just have to have some as soon as she got into the office.  She just made the usual train, skittering in ahead of the closing doors, and dumped herself down in a seat, breathing heavily and hoping she wasn’t too sweaty, at least not where it showed.

When the girls racketed on board she could  _ feel _ her face light up.  She bounced up for their rough hugs and cheerful greetings, feeling proud of them for heading out early each day to do their good works, hugging to herself the secret knowledge of the treats she would have for them soon.  Her ears were pricked all the time for remarks that might indicate what someone wanted or needed; she felt a little like a fairy godmother, albeit one who felt like Cinderella had come to rescue  _ her,  _ and was twelve people.  She went over it all as she walked from her stop to the office.  Mental note, the strap was fraying off of Ella’s backpack, and it was a cheap shabby thing — a strong new one from a fashionable sportswear brand was the obvious choice.  Mental note, the screen of Chip’s phone was cracked — it still  _ worked _ but the phone was clearly a few years old, quite thick compared with the latest models.  Mental note, she really should get Sharky a Magic Wand or a Bodywand, either way a good strong oscillating massager of her own.

_ But then maybe she wouldn’t want to come and see me to use mine. _

_ Well… I have other ways to appeal to her, to all of them…  I do still want it to be a treat to come to my place.  They enjoyed the champagne.  A touch of luxury.  A bit of pampering, being spoiled — well, they deserve it for a change.  I should invite them for next weekend and have things all ready this time.  Food and wine, treats… and although it’s less than elegant I should probably get some of those pop-up air mattresses so they can sleep over without being in the bath or on the floor.   A sort of indoor glamping. _

She wasn’t at her best at work that day, distracted and inclined to daydream.  At lunchtime she popped out and bought Chip a nice rose gold iPhone and a protective case for it.  An odd thought occurred to her as she paid; would it look like favouritism if she gave Chip a valuable present today, and only her?  Would there be hurt feelings?  But a dozen iPhones would seem strange and impersonal, that wasn’t the answer.  Maybe she should save it for the weekend and give herself the week to make sure she had something for everyone — make it like Christmas!  Only nicer because, well, not with her family.  

During her afternoon meeting she doodled on a pad and made lists.  

Sharky — wand ♡

Gigi — table

Chip — phone

Jay — shoes (Louboutin Bip Bip Strass)

Skinny — Nicki Minaj’s perfumes, she mentioned loving the bottles

Carnie — was talking a lot about Nintendo Switch (make sure she hasn’t got one somehow)

Ella — always going on about  _ Hamilton,  _ know it’s sold out but can ask around 

Kay — currently v tight w Ella, get them two tickets for a date or else Coach satchel she liked

Beez — where do you buy a UNICYCLE?  try _ Brooklyn _ I guess

Dixie — Hairdresser shears (GOOD ONES — ask at salon what they recommend)

Nina — full set of Copic markers

Bunny — gold hoops

She felt it was shaping up nicely, and the fact that she had to scramble like a maniac to finish what she was meant to get done that afternoon was only a minor irritant.

She waited eagerly in the crush on the train home, not even caring that some nearby idiot was vaping something that smelled like root beer, until she realised they had passed the usual stop where the girls got on.  They weren’t always  _ all _ there but the only times she’d passed that stop without  _ any  _ of them getting on had been when they were AWOL at their music festival — and why would they not be here  _ tonight? _  She had just time to think of all sorts of miserable things before she felt her phone buzzing and elbowed the vaping enthusiast in the brisket getting it out.

_ FUCK missed train sorry baby _

_ was my bad Holly I got trapped in toilet door lock broke! _

_ she had 2 climb out ova stall bc no way was gona limbo outta there _

_ did u see that fuckin floor i woud get leprosy _

_ It’s okay, _ Holly replied with both relief and disappointment,  _ that’s not your fault, glad you’re okay.  With no leprosy. _

_ u can only catch leprosy from an armadillo _

_ wtf K _

_ I swaer _

_ im stuck at work but im googlin that shit _

_ ITS TRUE _

_ NO ONE EVER BELIEVES ME _

_ omg K u got it bkwrd armadillos are the only animal WE can give leprosy TO _

_ how the fuck does anyone know that _

_ wat sick fuck give an armadillo leprosy _

_ was for science _

_ HAH NEW YORK TIMES SAYS U CAN GET LEPROSY FROM ARMADILLOS _ **_FROM_ ** _ ARMADILLOS BITCHES  _

_ this escalated rly quickly _

_ the armadillos r tearing us apart _

_ Hey since we can’t meet Holly — can u come meet us? _

_ YEAH come meet us well get drinks! _

The address of a bar popped up; if she got off at the next stop and changed lines it wouldn’t take long to get there.   _ It’s a work night, _ said a voice in her head that suddenly sounded less sensible and more old and repressed and farty.   _ Lots _ of people went out for drinks after work, lots of perfectly normal people who actually had social lives.  Still, she bargained with the disapproving voice.

_ Let me drop off my things at home and change and I’ll come straight over. _

_ YES _

_ wear something slutty _

_ sry 2 say I looked thru her wardrobe n Holly doesn’t have nething slutty _

The hairs on the back of Holly’s neck prickled.  Oh God, they hadn’t looked under the sweaters on the top shelf, had they?  Wouldn’t something have been said?  The iPad and MacBook had been undisturbed when she’d fetched them down, and she’d realised, too late as one often does, that it would have been far more sane to have stashed them somewhere in her study where it would just have looked as if she was being tidy, not paranoid and suspicious.  Why were they so  _ nosy? _

_ well that is just a waste _

_ I mean her clothes are all rly nice no shade Holly _

_ but u got a lota grey n beige n black u gota get sum colors for spring n summer girl _

_ well don’t worry about slutty u can just wear like jeans and a tshirt this place aint fancy _

_ NO JEANS _

_ NO JEANS? _

_ I don’t like jeans,  _ Holly cut in, trying to assert herself.   _ I can never find any that fit right and the fly always digs into my tummy when I sit. _

_ it feels like… unpatriotic not to have jeans _

_ don’t listen to them Holly you will look great in anything wear what YOU like _

_ okay but in the name of dressing slutty maybe no undies? _

She gave a snort of undignified laughter and the vape man had the nerve to look at her as if  _ she _ was inappropriate.

At home she knew she was running the risk of getting bogged down in anxious indecision until she couldn’t go.

“Wear anything,” she told herself aloud, standing in her bedroom in her underwear.  “Anything!  Not this for starters.”  She pulled off her underpants and then didn’t know if she could follow through.  Had it been a joke and if they found she’d actually done it would they laugh?  No, she was being paranoid, they  _ loved _ that sort of thing.  But she didn’t want to go barelegged, the nights were still cool, so that was an actual  _ practical _ reason to wear a garter belt and stockings.

After some pacing and half a glass of rosé she decided she could wear the black cocktail dress with the burgundy leather blazer to try to make it less formal.  As an outfit it looked too wintry but she knew she had to force herself out the door and try not to care about it too much.  She touched up her make-up and shovelled the necessities into a smaller handbag, put on the corset shoes Jay had liked so much and hurried out, already thinking in the elevator that she should have changed her jewellery and this neckline really needed a necklace.

_ No.  I’m going out now, I’m going to meet my girlfriends at a bar and we’re going to have a nice time.  That is a normal thing people do, it’s a thing I’m allowed to do, it’s really a thing I’m  _ supposed  _ to do, isn’t it?  I’m going out in public with no panties on.  Not supposed to do  _ that.   _ I mean, I know my skirt is knee length but what if I get hit by a truck?  If I get hit by a truck people seeing my bare bottom will be the least of my worries.  Just start walking and find a cab.   _

By the time she arrived at the bar she had shifted to worrying, irrationally, that they would have left already because she took too long, without telling her anything, to teach her a lesson, and that the bar would be somehow too scary for her.  Full of, well, she knew how completely stupid this was to worry about, but lesbians.   _ Proper _ lesbians who knew how they were supposed to dress and talk and everything and felt like they were coming home when they joined “the community” instead of feeling terrified of everyone and would immediately recognise her as an interloper and impostor who spent her life trying to pass for nothing in particular, never actually saying she wasn’t but certainly never mentioning she was.  

_ I am going to need a very stiff drink. _

Firstly, the bar was nothing like as divey as she had feared.   _ (Snob.) _  All right, but it could easily have been in a rough street where any reasonable person would be on alert.  The girls seemed so fearless, and obviously not shy of physical fighting; their standards of risk were different.  It was just sort of cosy and colourful and scruffy without being grimy.  Like them, really.  Secondly, the clientele seemed to be a mixed group of people in terms of gender and age and most visible characteristics, really.  There was a rainbow flag pinned up on one wall but there was also an Irish flag and an Indian one and another wall was taken up by a sort of flat sculpture of an elephant done in pieces of corrugated roofing iron, so you could comfortably say there was a lot going on aesthetically.  Anyway, the people were neither all one group that she obviously didn’t belong to, nor all one group that she ought to belong to but didn’t, which helped.  

“Holly!”

“There you are, girl!”

“We were organising a search party!”

They were crowded in and around a corner booth at the back of the room, a muddle of pitchers and glasses and plates of nachos on the table.  Jay was seated at the outmost corner of the table and hopped up to weave her way between tables and chairs to hug Holly, plant an exuberant kiss on her lips and tow her back to the others.

_ Just got kissed in public,  _ that _ hasn’t happened in a while.   _ It had been over too quickly and she wanted another pass at it.  As they reached the table she pulled back on Jay’s arm, and when she turned, put her free hand on her shoulder, and kissed her a little harder than she had meant to, almost bumping noses.  Jay laughed delightedly and pulled her down to sit on her lap.  The others were bounding up, leaning around and over the table to smooch her and stroke her hair and, with one agile lunge from Skinny, pat her on the butt while she was half out of Jay’s lap to kiss Gigi.  By the time she sat down again she was pink and flushed and warm and pleasantly fluttery where Jay held her with her arms around her waist.

_ “I _ will get  _ you _ a  _ drink,” _ Sharky declared, clambering across laps to get out from behind the table.  “You eaten?”

“Get the wings,” Carnie demanded.

“I asked _Holly,_ ” Sharky said.  “You want the wings, Holly?  Buffalo wings?  Monday night special!”

“Um, yes, please, and to drink —” Sharky was already gone and Jay was giving her a gentle bounce on her knee, nuzzling her neck.

“You smell like a flower,” she said.  

“I didn’t have time to put on any perfume this morning.”

“I know, I’m buttering you up, buttercup.”

“Guess who I saw at McDonald’s today,” Gigi interrupted, leaning across the table to pull a nacho plate closer to herself.  “But he didn't see me.  Devin the cereal bandit!”

“Ohhhh shit!”

“Should I know who Devin is?” Holly asked hesitantly.  

_ “Well,”  _ said Gigi, her eyes lighting up, and she launched into one of the rambling collaborative storytelling sessions that the girls loved even when everyone present already knew the story backwards; having someone new to tell only increased the energy they devoted to voices, gestures, chipping in bits the lead narrator might have forgotten and generally bringing the tale to chaotic life.  At some stage Sharky returned from the bar and clapped a Long Island iced tea down in front of Holly before picking up the thread of the story and joining in one of the call-and-response parts as if she had never left.  Holly was reminded of nothing so much as an expert at jump rope hopping between the double Dutch ropes without hesitation.  

The story began with the crimes of Devin, an erstwhile roommate of Gigi and Kay, and his midnight filching of the favourite, special, jealously hoarded breakfast cereal of another roommate called Whitley.

“She was like this breakfast dragon, all rollin’ around on her mountain of granola, flamethrowin’ anyone who looked at it too long.”

For complex reasons that Holly followed imperfectly, the cereal crimes had led to a debt of honour on Gigi’s part and an epic series of trades, substitutions and bets with an astonishing variety of people across the city culminating in a complete loss of whatever had once been the plot, a small gas explosion, a rooftop chase and the theft of a cat from an NYU professor.

“We had to do it.”

“He was a dick.”

“She was a pure heart.  We couldn’t leave her there.”

“So then I told Whitley —”

“What happened to the cat?” Holly asked, perplexed.  She was near the bottom of her Long Island iced tea and the world was a warmer and softer place but she wasn’t getting any smarter.

“Took her with us when we went upstate for the music fest and gave her to Amy.  She was already riding the Roombas when we went home.”

“So this has happened just since I knew you?”  It was incredible the amount of  _ life _ they seemed to pack into their time.  Apart from work projects she could think of hardly anything she’d done in that span.

“Yes,” said Gigi with satisfaction, “and Devin’s eyebrows  _ still _ haven’t grown back.”  High fives were exchanged.

“You wanna come on an adventure with us sometime, Mama?” Jay asked.

“Don’t call me that in  _ public.” _

“Why not?”

“I — I like it to be our  _ private  _ thing.  So it’s more intimate.”   _ And I don’t need to think anyone’s thinking I do look old enough to be your mother.  I mean technically I  _ am. _  If I were a poor little teenage mother.  Oh Holly,  _ stop.  “What kind of adventure?”

“Ah, we never know when they start.  You know we could already be on one.”

“Yeah, you can never really ID an adventure till things are already way out of hand,” said Sharky.  “Getcha another, Duchess?”

“Oh my fuck, like the Russian gnome incident,” exclaimed Kay, and another story started.  Holly listened avidly, sipping her drink, gradually caring less about publicly gnawing on wings and sucking sauce off her fingers.  The combination of getting tipsy and the spicy sauce made her lips warm and tingly, and she took the little paper umbrella from the first cocktail glass and tucked it into Jay’s hair as a decoration.  When Jay excused herself to the bathroom she found herself transferred to Ella’s lap; Ella kissed her behind the ear and fondled her hip, smacking her gum appreciatively.  When Ella saw someone she knew across the room and had to go accost them, she was shuffled on to Sharky.

“I did what you wanted,” she said, leaning in to speak by Sharky’s ear, not sure she’d hear her if she whispered.

“Huh?”  Sharky looked up at her, raised her hand to wipe away a dab of sauce from the corner of Holly’s mouth with her thumb, then licked her thumb clean, her tongue gumdrop pink.  

“No underwear,” Holly mumbled.  A wave of laughter at the denouement of the gnome incident went up.

“No what?” Sharky asked, grinning.  Holly didn’t know if she honestly hadn’t heard or was just trying to get her to shout in a public place that she wasn’t wearing underwear.  

She leaned in close to Sharky’s ear again and bit the lobe to secure her full attention.  “No underwear,” she said quietly but distinctly, and swept her tongue across the row of silver studs.  Sharky shivered and giggled and tightened her arm around Holly’s waist.

“Well, now you gotta show me,” she said.

“How can I show you?  What are you going to do, crawl under the table and stick your head up my skirt?”

“No, duh, it’d be too dark to see.  C’mon.”  Sharky dragged her out of the booth, over several of her friends’ laps.

“Where’re you off to?” Skinny asked, hooking an arm around Holly’s waist.

“Little girls’ room,” Sharky said, her grin brighter than ever.  Skinny let go and Sharky bore Holly away to a door marked Restrooms.  “I really need a  _ rest,  _ don’t you Holls?”

There was a lot going on aesthetically in here too; for some reason the four stalls in the women’s bathroom had been painted inside and out with a replica of Van Gogh’s  _ Starry Night. _  Holly couldn’t imagine what it would be like to try to pee while seriously drunk or otherwise addled and surrounded by swirly post-impressionist stars and cypresses.  She was quickly so surrounded because Sharky pushed her into one of the stalls, hopped in after her and slid the bolt.  By sheer luck there hadn’t been anyone else visible when they came in; she thought she could hear someone in one of the other stalls, but there wasn’t time to think much about it because Sharky was kissing her and all she wanted was to wrap her arms around her and kiss back.  Her mouth tasted beery and spicy and her tongue undulated against Holly’s as lasciviously as she had ever seen her kissing any of the other girls.  

Sharky drew back before Holly was ready, leaving her open-mouthed and craning her head forward, trying to stay joined.  She smiled down at her fondly but teasingly, and Holly wondered how foolish she must look.  “I love how pink you go when you’re drunk and horny,” Sharky whispered.

“I’m not _ drunk,”  _ Holly whispered back.

“Noted.  C’mon, show.”  She slid her hands down over Holly’s hips and began tugging her skirt up her thighs.  Holly undid the button of her blazer, with a touch of regret because she clung to the belief that it made her waistline look neater, and helped her.  She felt awkward as hell standing holding her skirt bunched up around her waist, but Sharky was standing back (as far as she could inside a toilet stall built for one) with her hands together against her lips in a prayer position.

“I feel like,” she said, “if I was more kind of  _ poetic _ I could  _ explain _ why this is so hot.  ‘Cuz there’s the soft shiny stockings, okay, there’s the kinda  _ frame _ effect with the garters, there’s the thick creamy thighs, there’s the broad strong hips and the lil’ round tummy and then there’s your pussy just tucked down there so cute and soft and curly — I mean fuck, I have no words for how cute your puss is, it’s not just a pussy, it’s a kitten.  But there’s no way to explain why all of that together is so great!”

“Are  _ you _ drunk?” Holly asked.

“Little bit,” said Sharky happily, and threw her arms around her again.  Holly squeaked softly and flung hers around Sharky’s shoulders as their lips met.  Sharky’s hands didn’t  _ wander,  _ they went  _ exploring _ all over her bottom, grasping and squeezing two handfuls and kneading them together.  Then the left continued to massage her bottom while the right brushed around her hip to the front and skimmed down to fondle her tummy just above her pubic hair.

“Oh shit,” said Sharky, breaking off the kiss suddenly.

“What?” said Holly, dazed and forgetting to whisper.  “What’s wrong?”

“Two seconds,” said Sharky, slamming back the bolt and barging out of the stall, leaving Holly scrambling to hide herself behind the swinging door.  She slammed it back into place and stood leaning on it, panting, hearing water running and Sharky cheerfully telling some other girl that she looked great, red was totally her colour, to which the girl in red replied that Sharky’s hair was gorgeous and asked whether she’d done it herself.

_ Did I just get  _ ditched?   _ But she was just waxing poetic about —  _  Holly felt a bump against the stall door, which she hadn’t got her act together to lock, and Sharky barged back in, saying, “Now, where were we?”

“What  _ happened?” _ Holly whispered frantically.  “Why did you just dive off?”

Sharky held up her hands like a surgeon going into theatre.  “I hadda wash my hands,” she said.  “I mean I’m a spontaneous so-and-so but you can’t just finger a girl after eating buffalo wings.  You know how bad chili can hurt your cooch?  Only thing I’ve ever heard makes it better is plain yoghurt straight out the fridge.”

“You — you were just thinking of me?  Trying to make sure I’d be comfortable?”

“Shit, yes, you think I’d let go of you for anything less?”

“That’s so  _ sweet.” _

“Well, if I’ve tricked you into thinking I’m  _ sweet _ let’s  _ do _ this,” Sharky said, giggling.  She pushed the bolt with her elbow and gathered Holly into her arms.  Her mouth was soft and hot and sloppily eager, and that giggle was still thrumming softly in her throat as she pushed her hand between Holly’s thighs, smoothing down over her soft curls and lightly squishing her wet lips.  “My favourite,” she whispered, stiffening her fingers and circling them so Holly caught her breath in delight.  “You’re so  _ wet.   _ Can I just come right in?”  She slipped in her forefinger, then her middle finger with it, stretching and flexing in Holly’s cunt.  “That good?  This is such a thing for you, isn’t it?  Semi-public, so dirty, so naughty, but you can’t help yourself, right?”

Holly hummed urgently, her feet slipping apart on the stall floor, high heels skittering and toes turning in.  She held on tight to Sharky’s shoulders for a little bit of stability.  Sharky was lightly pumping her fingers and she could  _ hear _ her own wetness as pleasure bloomed around that stroke.  

“Holly’s such a bad girl now,” Sharky crooned by her ear, slipping her fingers out and drawing them up to rub around her swelling clitoris.  “So horny she just can’t stop.  That’s what happens when you loosen up on those inhibitions, boom, they  _ all _ go.”  Her voice dropped a note.  “That’s what you’re telling yourself, right?”

Holly whimpered and nodded, resting her cheek on Sharky’s shoulder.  

“I understand, baby, it’s okay.”  Sharky’s voice had returned to that rough purr as she worked Holly’s clitoris more firmly.  “I’m gonna take care of you.  Sharky understands.  You’ve been holding it in so hard, controlling yourself, it’s too much, right?  Here’s the part where you say yes, yes, oh my God yes.”  Holly felt Sharky’s mouth curve into a smile against her cheek as she slipped her fingers down again and inside her, deeper.

“Yes,” she said breathlessly, and then couldn’t say the rest because Sharky was rubbing an area that felt so good she could only gasp.

“Ooh, we found something good there,” Sharky murmured.  “Right?  Is this what Skinny found, made you squirt like a hydrant?  Now I wanna see if I can too.”

“Oh God,” Holly said, heels teetering as Sharky stroked the sweet spot.

“Don’t you wanna?  Such a sloppy little slut, you must wanna, right?  You want to really lose control.”

“It’s too messy,” Holly protested.  

“It’s a bathroom, we’re all set for clean-up.”

“Oh  _ God,”  _ she muttered, desperate.

“If I’m pushing too hard, you tell me, okay?  This is only fun as long as you’re into it.”  The movement slowed.

“No, I  _ want _ you to push me!”

“Well all  _ right.” _  That curving smile again, sharp and hot, and Sharky’s breath against her ear as her fingers worked.  “C’mon, Holly, let me make you lose it.  Tell me what you want.”

“I want… oh fuck, oh God.”  She knew she was precious close to losing it anyway and she wanted to get her surrender in first.  “Make me come.  Make me — fuck, Sharky, make me squirt, I don’t care, I need it.”

“Yeah you do.  Okay, I got this, we’re not gonna flood the floor.  Turn round, baby, lean over the john, just put your elbows on the tank.”

“Isn’t this a little gross?” Holly panted, getting into position.  It was actually pretty clean for a bar toilet, she didn’t feel as if she was at any grave risk of contamination, but she still felt just a vestige of an obligation to raise an objection.

“Psh.  That’s why you’re into it.  Miss Holly Agate, high and mighty, wants to get fucked in the  _ nastiest _ places.”  From behind she slid her fingers inside again, feeling down along the tense front wall of Holly’s pussy, gliding to the spot that was so responsive and working it firmly.  Holly moaned and smothered the sound against her own arm.  “That’s what you need, isn’t it?”  Her other hand was firm on Holly’s ass; Holly could feel one strong leg pressed hard against hers, and those fingers were pumping fast.  “You didn’t get it on the subway tonight, so you must be desperate, right?”

“Right,” Holly whimpered.

“Poor Holly, all wet and needy and no one to hold you and squeeze you and work this greedy gushy pussy.  Good thing I’m here now, right?”

“Right.”  The tension was gathering, everything pulling together inside her, tight and hot and dark, pleasure so fierce that she was shivering and panting.

“Come for me, come on, you can do it,” Sharky was crooning.  “Let it all go and I’ll get you there.  Whoa!  There you go.  Hit a gusher.”  She gripped Holly’s hip, bracing her as she rode the air in sharp jerks, pulses of joy rushing through her and escaping in warm liquid spurts.

The pulsing faded, Holly’s knees began to tremble and she sagged down a little before Sharky’s arm curled under her belly and held her steady.  She was still gently stroking her pussy, the outer lips now, soothing it down.  “Shhh.  Shh, you’re okay.  Hey, hardly even any mess, just a little spray on the seat.  Such a  _ tidy _ little squirter.  Good job.”  She patted Holly’s bottom with a wet hand and Holly began to giggle helplessly.  “Yeah, I think you needed that.”  Her hand lifted and Holly heard her sucking her fingers clean.  “Talk to me, baby, are you okay?”

“Yes,” Holly said, managing to catch her breath and slip out of that odd weak giggling.  “Oh, I feel so good but I’m  _ awfully _ embarrassed.”

“I think getting embarrassed is just part of feeling good for you.  Here, let’s get you cleaned up.”  She helped Holly to stand and gently patted her pussy and thighs dry with toilet paper; Holly was a little thrown again by the  _ kindness _ of it, by how someone who had sounded genuinely gleeful while telling her she wanted to get fucked in the nastiest places was now equally genuinely concerned to make sure she was clean and comfortable with her clothes straightened up and ready to go back out.  

“Wasn’t this frustrating for you?” Holly asked hesitantly as they were washing their hands.  “I didn’t do anything for you.”

“Huh?  No, it was great.  Listen, one thing I’m really good at is saving up a memory to get off to later.  This is gonna get me through a  _ lot _ of nights,” Sharky said, and flashed her that wicked smile again as she dried her hands.  “Hey, if you wanna play around with this stuff some more, I would love to.  I mean, if you’re really into the humiliation, domination thing, we can take it a  _ lot _ further.  Think about it and we can talk it over later.”  She buttoned Holly’s blazer for her.  “There, no one’d ever know.  Except you do have that pretty just-got-fucked- _ right _ colour in your cheeks.”

“That and we’ve been gone at least half an hour,” Holly pointed out, “so the options are one of us was very sick and the other was helping her, we were doing silly amounts of drugs  _ or _ we were canoodling.”

“That is a great word.  I’m gonna use that.  Let’s get back and see if there’s any food left, all that canoodling gave me an appetite.”

They were welcomed back to the table with whistles and laughter and high-fives for both of them, which Sharky accepted as her due and Holly caught inexpertly.  

“You stole my Holly,” said Jay reproachfully, gathering her back onto her lap.  “I came back from the bathroom and you were cuddling her and I went to get another drink and you were both gone.”

“That’s what I do,” Sharky said, shrugging.  “You left her unattended and in minutes she was wriggling her hot little ass on my knee telling me she wasn’t wearing any undies, so I ask you, what choice did I have?”

“I guess none,” Jay said philosophically, hugging Holly round the waist.  

“You’re not upset, are you?” Holly asked, troubled.

Jay looked up at her and smiled.  “Only that I missed it.  I’ll make up for it another time.  That true about your undies?”

“Yes.”

“We’ve been such a good bad influence on you,” Jay said, and kissed her neck.

There were more drinks, a toast to Holly’s underwear or lack thereof, a drinking game that she played predictably badly.  She was just turning away from the bar, where she had ordered more food for the group, when she felt an unpleasant pang in her lower abdomen.   _ Oh, not now.   _ This was the first unmistakable cramp.  She had been dismissing a few earlier aches as surely just after-effects of an intense orgasm, or possibly the result of eating a lot of spicy greasy bar food, but that was a period cramp through and through and now she thought about it, it  _ was  _ about time.  Then, with dawning horror, she felt something hot and wet slip out of her.   _ I cannot drip blood on the floor, that is just not happening. _  She pressed her thighs together, praying for the leaky feeling to stop, to be only a tiny bit, but it was substantial.  She stood as if rooted to the spot, wondering what was going to happen if she tried to move, trying to talk herself through the alarm.  

_ Look.  You have chubby legs.  Your thighs touch.  One good thing about that is that they are actually functioning somewhat as a dam.  There’s a lot of surface area for any liquid to run over before it can fall free and its — its volume or whatever will be decreasing because it leaves some of itself behind as it runs.  Okay?  Okay.  And your skirt goes to below your knees.  You have cover.  And the leak is done.  That was all for now.  So you’re not going to panic.  You’re going to wait a moment, not rush off, let it…   _ settle  _ and then walk briskly to the bathroom.  You’re coping.  You are  _ coping.

In a toilet stall, surrounded again by  _ Starry Night,  _ she hitched up her skirt and even though she was  _ coping _ began to cry silently, just because she didn’t need this, didn’t need to see wine-red blood smeared all over her inner thighs, looking as if she’d been half-killed, and soaked into her nice stockings.  A thin trickle of it had reached below her knee and might even be visible when her skirt was down.  She didn’t know what to do.  She sat down on the toilet with her head in her hands and froze when there was a tap on the stall door.

“Holly?”  It was Jay, speaking quietly.  “Are you okay?  I saw you go really pale and then take off.  You sick, babe?”

“No,” Holly said, trying and failing to keep a sob out of her voice.

Jay’s voice got softer.  “What’s wrong, baby?  Let me help.”

Holly leaned forward, clutching her bundled skirt, and slid the bolt across before sitting back down.  Jay came in, holding the door to screen her as well as she could, and locked it behind her.  “Ah,” she said, looking down.  Holly looked too and saw spots of blood on the floor.  A miserable whine rose up in her and she had to put her hand over her mouth.

“It’s okay.”  Jay leaned in to hug her around the shoulders.  “Fuckin’ sucks your period started when you were having a good time, but you’ll be okay.  Hey, this  _ is _ your period, right?  You didn’t get stabbed or anything?”  She gave a crooked attempt at a smile.  “We try not to hang out in stabby places.  I’d leave them a really shitty comment on Yelp.”

“I feel disgusting,” Holly said, wiping her eyes on the back of her hand.

“Aw, you’re not disgusting.  Shit happens.  We’ll get you cleaned up and get you a tampon and you’ll be good as new.”

“I don’t have any underwear.  I don’t — a tampon isn’t enough, I want insurance, I just want a  _ barrier,  _ and I don’t have any  _ underwear.”   _ She started to cry in earnest, her face crumpling, and Jay shuffled closer, crouching awkwardly in front of the toilet to hug her tight.  “It serves me right, doesn’t it?”

“Does not.  Okay, let’s think about it.  Slightly weird suggestion, but what if I go commando and then you can wear my undies?  Put a pad in ‘em and you’re basically in clean underwear.  How about it?  Like a get-you-home spare tyre.”

Holly sniffed hard.  “Really?”

“Yeah, I don’t mind.  Just want you to feel better.”  Jay sat back and brushed Holly’s hair back with her fingertips, looking into her tearstained face.  “Once I got my period on a roller coaster.  Right at the start.  It was like rattling it out of me.  By the time the ride ended it had gone through my jeans and I left a little blood on the seat.  I felt  _ so gross  _ leaving that for someone else to deal with but what could I do?  Just went home with my sweatshirt tied round my waist.”

“Oh my God, that’s  _ much _ worse,” said Holly, startled, and then, “I’m sorry!  Oh, I’m sorry, I didn’t mean to be —”  Jay was laughing, though.

“Don’t worry about it,” she said, shaking her head.  “It’s just a war story.  And one day this will be too.  Let’s fix you up.  I’ll get a pad from the machine.”

They ended up throwing Holly’s stockings in the sanitary bin.  It felt strange putting on underwear that was warm from being on someone else’s body, different even to clothes warm from the dryer.  The sense of relief at having a pad snug between her legs and held there firmly by underpants — Jay’s were a little tight on her — was tremendous, though.  They stood still in the stall, Jay hugging her tight and Holly leaning against her.

“You’re really sort of my hero now,” she mumbled.

“Yuss,” said Jay, making a little fist-pump gesture against her back.  “To the rescue.  You feel okay now?”

“I feel better, but I want to go home.”

“Yeah, you probably had enough excitement for one night.”  Jay kissed the top of her head.  “Let’s get you a cab.”

She didn’t offer to come home with her and Holly shrank from asking when she had already been so much trouble.  She was put into the taxi with many hugs and kisses and lamentations that she couldn’t stay but they all understood, and well-meant tips about heat pads as if she hadn’t been having her period since before some of them were born.  She caught sight of the taxi’s dashboard clock and was appalled to realise it was a quarter to midnight.

At least, she reflected as she put her key in the door, she was coming home to a clean house.  Everything was tidy again, everything smelled fresh.  With a frisson of absolute horror she realised that she had completely forgotten to do anything about the wet spot on the couch.  The maid had had to deal with that too.  The couch looked pristine.  God, a fifty-dollar tip hadn’t been enough.  

“Please,” she said aloud to the silent apartment, “let her have thought it was a spilled drink.”  She washed her face, brushed her teeth and fell asleep in her clothes, one hand cupping her aching lower tummy, pretending it was Jay’s.


	6. Chapter 6

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Disclaimer: there is, in fact, no sex in this chapter. I know. What is this shit coming to?

Holly always felt more tired than usual with her period but had absolutely made things worse for herself with a late night and a lot to drink.  She missed her morning train, and thus the girls, and had to wait for the next while texting them her apologies, and while she technically wasn’t late her habit of being early meant that arriving only on time still looked bad.  Ms Diamond’s secretary gave her what she thought was a very pitying look while she was sucking down her second cup of coffee in a row in the break room, and Holly thought but did not say some very poisonous things about people who looked down on others but couldn’t keep their own bangs out of their eyes.  

Marguerite Blauw had an odd waifish aesthetic built around ballet flats, floaty layers and generally looking as if she would blow away in a strong breeze.  She was so soft-spoken she was sometimes hard to understand and all in all was the reverse of the image of cool efficiency Holly would have expected of the secretary of someone so high-powered; she was pretty much the opposite of Yelena Perlman from the Los Angeles office, with her click-clack kitten heels and crisp ruffled blouses, but then Yelena Perlman was a nasty little madam who loved to see people get into trouble, whereas about the worst Marguerite would ever do to you was absent-mindedly doodle a caricature of you on a Post-It with a message for you.  

Then she remembered she needed to be nice to Marguerite because she was the musical theatre fiend of the office and probably knew how she could get  _ Hamilton _ tickets; thank God she had given her those  _ Wicked _ tickets she hadn’t wanted in January.  Marguerite had been delighted; she actually had a statuette of the Good Witch Glinda on her desk.  Holly had always thought of cultivating Marguerite’s goodwill as a useful strategy to help her make a good impression on Ms Diamond, but now it was Marguerite herself she needed to curry favour with.  That  _ would _ happen on a day when the little mouse was looking at  _ her _ with pity.

_ Then _ she realised she was wearing one black shoe and one brown one.  She’d thought it was such a good idea to get a style she really loved in more than one colour for versatility.  They’d felt the same stumbling around her bedroom with her eyes half shut.  She closed her eyes all the way and quietly wished she would implode, and when it didn’t happen took two Tylenol and resolved that even if everyone in the office stood together and asked her why her shoes didn’t match she would jump out a window rather than acknowledge it.

What kept her going was the string of sweet texts that kept coming through from her girls, hoping she felt better, sending her ridiculously cute animal videos to cheer her up, including one of a small brown cat proudly riding a Roomba while someone with an extremely dorky laugh cackled in the background.  She was startled to open one message and see Beez had sent a photo she must have taken the night before, Holly sitting on Jay’s lap at the bar.  Neither of them was looking at the camera, they were looking at each other, Jay with that wonderful silly smile she sometimes had that crinkled her nose, and Holly, well, she wasn’t overly pleased with how she looked in photos but she had never seen a picture of herself looking so happy.  Her face was flushed and a little shiny and she had been kidding herself if she thought that blazer was slimming but she looked really, truly happy.  She had  _ felt _ happy but she hadn’t realised it shone out of her face like that.  It made her feel a bit exposed.  Beez had added, “Hope you feel like this again soon, xoxo,” and one of her emoji… poems, Holly was starting to think they were.

_ You are so sweet to me, _ she replied.  Red heart yellow heart green heart blue heart purple heart, answered Beez.

At lunchtime she sent out a group message inviting them to her place for Saturday night.   _ Or Friday if that suits you better,  _ she quickly added.   _ I wasn’t sure if you’d already have plans so I can be flexible. _

_ Sat’s gr8 I got work Fri >:( _

_ Sat’s gr9 for me _

_ What’s gr9? _ Holly asked, baffled.

_ 1 more than gr8 _

The consensus seemed to be that Saturday was gr9 for everyone except Chip, who had a late shift but wanted them to go ahead and she would come over as soon as she was done.

_ Last time was impromptu which was lovely but I couldn’t really show you proper hospitality. _

_ Woah, if that wasn’t proper hospitality what is? _

_ Like a Mariah Carey tour rider, we all get a complimentary basket of kittens  _

_ nething u want us to bring Holly? _

_ Just yourselves and anything you need to be comfortable and enjoy the evening. _

_ okay check big bag o weed _

_ You might also want your toothbrush but feel free.  Please let me know any special requests for food, drinks etc — my treat. _

_ orange soda _

_ I KNEW you’d say orange soda _

_ if it’s wrong to love orange soda I don’t wana be right _

_ There will be orange soda on ice just for you, Chippy. _

_ Chippy ♡♡♡♡♡ _

_ oh she’s yours now Holly _

_ I GOT A PET NAME _

_ ur pet name means ho _

_ yes I am her pet ho, problem? _

_ I did not mean it like that! _

_ it’s okay I love it.  hey did u think any more about what tattoo u want? _

_ Did I say I want a tattoo? _

_ well I wouldn’t hold u to anything u said when u were drunk but u were getting pretty keen on the idea early hours of Sunday.  u were thinking a vine of blue morning glory curling round the thigh _

_ I can’t remember that at all. _

_ I could just draw it on u w a pen for a test drive _

_ Holly your thighs have a very special place in my spank bank _

_ Sharky you romantic devil _

_ it’s just true _

_ not a lot of compliments more sincere than I love to rub one out thinking of you _

_ roses r red, violets r blue, I rub one out, thinking of u _

_ lmao _

_ put that on a card next Feb we’re gonna be rich _

_ it’s got kind of a lik the bred vibe _

_ my name is Jay and wen its nite or wen the moon is shyning brite and Holly sends invite to us I stay up late.  I lik the puss. _

_ You have totally lost me.  But thank you, Jay, the thought is appreciated. _

_ hey question and sorry if this is weird, but are you okay with period sex? _

Holly blinked at her phone.   _ It’ll be over by Saturday. _

_ I meant for tonight, magic circle  _ _ ;P _

_ we r okay but its okay if ur not okay _

_ I hadn’t even considered it,  _ Holly replied truthfully.  She knew she shouldn’t feel shocked, because logically and reasonably furtive semi-public group sex did not somehow  _ tip over _ into perversion territory because one of the participants was menstruating, but she still was a little.

_ honestly I love period sex?  like I’ve never found anything that clears cramps like cumming rly hard, plus I think it squishes it out faster so ur periods not as long _

_ squishes it out?  ewwwwww lol _

_ I know but srsly mine can run 5 days I’ve got it down to 3 w good fucking wish I cd pull that off every month _

_ wish that worked on me I swear my uterus wants to kill me _

_ right now? _

_ no thank god finally got to planned parenthood n the new pills r helping  _

_ YAY so glad _

_ take that dumb uterus _

_ ur not gonna hurt our Skinny ne more _

_ so hey hang on Holly u hadn’t considered it, now u considered it okay or not?  or need time to think? _

Holly began to type  _ Not,  _ but her thumb hovered over the send button.  Speaking of time, she was almost out of lunch break and still needed to go to the bathroom and take more Tylenol and generally sort herself out.   _ Not tonight, need time to think _ was what she sent.

About mid-afternoon she began to worry that they would take that to mean she didn’t want to  _ see _ them tonight, not just that she didn’t want a magic circle.  She was too busy with a series of important conference calls to do anything about it and the cramps were punching through anything the Tylenol could do.  She felt stretched so thin trying to appear normal and confident and positive that it would only have taken a run in her pantyhose to make her cry, so of course that happened just after four,  _ and  _ the corner of the desk drawer that she hadn’t closed properly scratched her calf quite painfully in the process and it was all her own fault.  Fortunately she was alone in her office by then.  

Unfortunately Marguerite tapped on her door and came right in just as she was tidying herself up.  Ms Diamond had sent feedback on Holly’s report on colour trends for their fall campaigns; the sheaf of paper was scribbled over with red pen and its edges thickened by stick-on note tabs.  The Post-It on top said “Holly” and next to it was a cartoon of her as… a panda?  Wonderful, just as the natural shadows under her eyes were augmented by smudged mascara.  Maybe Marguerite  _ was _ as mean as Yelena.  No, that was paranoid, she wouldn’t have had time to see the state of Holly’s eyes when she drew the doodle.

“Thank you so much,” she said as brightly as she could.  “I’ll review this tonight and have my revisions ready first thing tomorrow.”

Marguerite stood in front of her desk looking uncertain, but that didn’t mean anything, Marguerite would look uncertain if you asked her her name.  “Are you okay?” she asked in her faint voice.  “Has something happened?”

“I’m perfectly all right, thank you.  I — I have allergies, spring, you know.”  She blotted under her eyes with a tissue, mentally cursing the way the concealer came off with the mascara.

Marguerite, quite compassionately, did not call attention to the fact that they were in an air-conditioned office on the fifteenth floor and the only flowers in the room were on Holly’s screensaver.  “If I can help in any way, please just ask,” she murmured.

_ Take the opportunity.  If she  _ is _ feeling sorry for me I hate that but maybe I can use it.   _ “There — there is something I need.  It’s not for me, it’s for a friend.  She would so love to see  _ Hamilton _ but of course tickets are sold out months in advance.  I know you love the theatre and I wondered if perhaps you know someone who has seats they can’t use?  I would be happy to pay whatever they paid.”

Marguerite nodded, her bangs falling further over her eyes, and Holly yearned for a pair of scissors.  “I will see.”  She turned to go, and then turned back.  “Don’t worry.”  She looked as if she wanted to say something else, but swallowed it and wafted out of the room.

Holly really hadn’t expected to hear anything about it for a while, and was waiting for the elevator at the end of the day feeling dead to the world and hoping she could somehow revive herself enough at home to slog through Ms Diamond’s corrections when she heard an odd little sound that proved to be someone calling her name from across the foyer in a near-whisper.  Marguerite came flittering over with an envelope in her hands.

“Here,” she said, holding it out to Holly.  “They’re for the Friday after next.  I hope that works for your friend.”

“You’re a miracle worker,” Holly said, stunned.  “What do I owe you?”

“Oh, nothing.  They were going to be a gift for a client who loved to go to shows, but the thing is he loved to go to shows with his partner who just left him.  For an actor.”

“Ouch,” said Holly, tucking her briefcase under her arm to accept the tickets.  

“I know,” said Marguerite, “but if they can make someone else happy I think that’s nice.”

“But I really should pay,” Holly tried again.

“They’re a gift,” said Marguerite, waving one long-fingered hand.  “I have a little discretion.  Well.  I can make something disappear from time to time if I need to,” she added in an even softer undertone.  

“I don’t want you to get into any trouble for me.  You’re being too kind.”

“I won’t.  You’ve been kind to  _ me.   _ I — I’ve always hoped there would be something you needed and I could help.”  As far as Holly could tell under the shadow of her floppy hair, Marguerite was blushing.  “Not that I hoped you’d have problems — oh, you know.  Bye-bye.”

She flittered off, leaving Holly feeling both grateful and something of a heel, to think Marguerite had taken calculated favours for genuine kindness.  She had no idea what to think of the caricatures now.  Were they an awkward attempt to be friendly?  But there was really no time to think about that now, one of her problems was solved and she needed to get to her train.  She shut the envelope safely inside her briefcase and hurried, actually forgetting about her stupid mismatched shoes.

At first she thought her fear had come true and they weren’t joining her, but it was just that about half the group couldn’t make it that night, which did happen sometimes, it just threw her when her nerves were already on edge.  Jay was there and Gigi, Carnie and Skinny as inseparable as usual, Kay and Dixie, and they insinuated themselves through the crowd to snuggle in around her, holding her even though their hands didn’t stray.  It put her in a strange situation.  They were entirely properly respecting her reluctance, but here she was surrounded by them and as aroused by their presence as always.  With fewer of them to form a screen it wouldn’t really have been safe to attempt anything vigorous so naturally her body decided to be really unhelpful; her pussy tingled and her nipples tightened and she kept imagining how it would feel to have them firmly pinched.  

“How’s our girl?” Jay asked, stroking a wisp of hair off her cheek.  

“Oh.  Fine.”  Holly attempted a smile even weaker then the one she’d summoned earlier for Marguerite.  “Just so tired.  It’s been a rough day.”

There were murmurs of “Aw, baby” (apparently not sarcastic) and “Poor Mama.”  She felt Gigi softly rubbing her lower back, and it was so comforting that she started tearing up again.   _ I have got to stop this.  Who wants to be with someone who cries all the time?  Who’s just a drain?  Especially not them, they’re  _ young _ and  _ fun.   _ They’re kind too but I’m bound to wear out their kindness.   _

“How would it be,” Jay asked, “if I took you home and took care of you a little?”

“Took care of me?”  Holly looked up at her blankly.

“Yeah, made you dinner and stuff.  When’s the last time someone made you dinner, and it wasn’t their job?”

“You don’t have to do that,” Holly said quickly.

“Yeah, that’s the point.  It’s  _ not _ my job.  I’d do it ‘cuz I want you to feel better.  I’d do it ‘cuz I want us to be able to take care of each other.  Yeah?”

“Just… you and me?”

“I’d take it if I was you,” said Skinny.  “No one makes you feel all cosy and spoiled like Jay.”

“If you just wanna be by yourself and cocoon up I understand,” Jay said, still stroking her cheek, “but I’m offering.”

“Yes… please.”  She had to keep a tight grip on herself not to dissolve with relief and gladness.  Her feelings were mixed, they were always mixed, she knew she couldn’t just relax because there were all those revisions to do, Jay would probably leave when she got to work on that because there was no reason to stick around when Holly didn’t want to have sex and it would be boring for her to wait around while she worked even if she did, but the thought of being taken care of when she felt like this was like water in the desert.  “Oh Jay, I would like that  _ so _ much.  If you’re  _ sure _ it’s all right.”

“Of course it’s all right, jeez,” said Jay, and hugged her closer.

As they walked to Holly’s building Jay noticed the shoes.  “You starting a new fashion there, Holls?” she asked, smiling.

“I was so tired this morning I wasn’t thinking straight,” Holly muttered.

“That’s okay, I can’t do  _ anything _ straight.”

A small  _ pff _ of amusement escaped between Holly’s lips.   _ “You _ could pull off mismatched shoes.”

“Well, my socks today don’t match.  Twins and we didn’t even know it.”

Holly thought involuntarily of the poster from the old Schwarzenegger-DeVito comedy and told herself to cut it the fuck out.  Even on her lowest days she knew she was prettier than Danny DeVito, and while there was a pleasing amount of muscle on Jay she did not deserve to be compared with Arnold Schwarzenegger.

In the elevator up she leaned against Jay.  “You know that feeling where you’re  _ nearly _ at a point where you can sit down and rest and the  _ last little bit _ of staying on your feet feels like the hardest part?”

“You can do it, hang in there,” Jay said, kissing her temple.  It would have been the top of her head if Holly hadn’t been in heels.  She realised she wanted very much to stand in her stocking feet and have the top of her head kissed.  When she let them into the apartment she stepped out of her shoes immediately with a soft hiss of relief.  

“Okay,” said Jay.  “I’m going to boss you around a little.  You go put your things down and go pee or whatever else you need to do to get comfortable, then you’re gonna lie on the couch with your feet up and I’m gonna get us a drink.”

Disobediently, Holly put down her briefcase and turned to face Jay, wrapping her arms around her waist and putting her forehead against her shoulder.  She felt Jay’s arms settle around her and tighten, and her chest lifting as she breathed in deeply.

“Okay,” Jay said, breathing out softly and ruffling the tendrils of hair that had escaped from Holly’s chignon.  “Hug first, I agree, good priorities.”  She turned her head and there was the kiss on top of Holly’s head; her shoulders rose and her toes curled under in delight.  

“There, I’m fortified for the next part,” Holly said.  She put her briefcase in the study, hung her jacket and handbag in the wardrobe, went to the toilet and washed her hands, hearing Jay clink around in the kitchen.  

“You got hardly anything in here,” Jay called out.

“I know, I haven’t shopped yet.  There should be at least one more bottle of wine in the pantry, the rack at the bottom.”  Holly emerged into the living room and flopped on the smaller couch per instructions, lying on her side with her head on the couch’s arm.  

“I am so not a wine person,” Jay said, her voice a little flattened by speaking into the pantry cupboard, “but you drink white wine chilled, right?  Room temp’s bad?”

“At this stage I honestly don’t care.”

“But it’s gross to put ice in it, right?”

“Mmhm.  What I like to do in summertime is freeze some grapes and float them in the glass.  They don’t water down the wine and they look pretty.”

“Plus they count towards your five a day,” said Jay, coming round the couch with two wine glasses.  She gave one to Holly and then, with the hand she had freed up, lifted up Holly’s feet, sat down and deposited them in her own lap.  Stroking Holly’s instep, she took a thoughtful sip from her glass.  “I know I’m drinking it wrong,” she said, “because it should be colder, but maybe I could be a minor league wine person.  This isn’t bad.  And I know enough not to call it peanut grease.”

Now Holly was worrying about her feet; she didn’t think they stank but she had been on them all day and they couldn’t smell fresh, but Jay seemed unconcerned.  She was still stroking the insteps with a warm hand.  She leaned her elbow on the opposite arm of the couch and cast a sidelong look at Holly.

“So Sharky gave me the full chapter and verse of what you got up to last night,” she said.  “She’ll brag about that for weeks.  You’re gonna be good for her, she hasn’t had anyone who’s super into her dirty-mouth dom thing since we broke up with Rochelle.”

“Oh.  I’m sorry you had a break-up,” Holly said, wondering how on earth you managed a break-up between thirteen people and whether a vote of no confidence was involved.

“Eh, amicable.  She got to move across country, live with her aunt and go to college like she wanted.  We all miss her but I’m glad she got to do it.  That aunt’s the only good one in the family, the rest of ‘em didn’t want to know her once she came out as trans.”  

“Oh,” said Holly again, very conscious that this was something she didn’t understand.  She didn’t want to stop anyone living their life the way they wanted but she wasn’t even sure exactly what most of the  _ words _ meant and had a feeling people were very touchy about the wrong words.  “Well, thank goodness for kind aunts.”

“I mean, I  _ like _ it,” Jay said, confusing her a moment before she realised she was back on Sharky, “but it doesn’t deep-down  _ move _ me like I think it moves you.  So I’m really happy you get to have that too.  I mean, I want you to know, I feel like out of the whole group you and me have something special, and it’s okay for you to have something special with any of the others too.  I realised the other night you might not know you’re not expected to like everyone exactly the same amount or the same way.  You need to  _ like _ all of us to be part of our thing but each of us has different connections to each of the others.”  She gave Holly’s right foot a gentle squeeze.

Holly took a deep sip of her wine so she wouldn’t get teary again and said, “That’s how I feel about you too.  And Sharky.  And possibly also Chip but I’m not quite sure yet.  I know about Sharky and you.”

“Look at you, all poly and everything,” Jay said, chuckling.  “You know what I want you to do next?”

“Next tonight or next in our relationships?”

“Just next tonight.  Take your drink, go take a nice hot deep bath and I’ll figure out something I can make us for dinner.  Go on now.”

Holly lay in a steaming bath with a hand towel rolled behind her neck, her eyes closed, letting her hands float, telling herself that she couldn’t indulge like this for too long.  When she got out she would put on clothes, not pyjamas, so she knew she was staying awake.  She couldn’t drink coffee or she would be awake all night, but a cup of green tea could help her stay clear-headed until she’d finished the revisions on the report.  The heat was so good though, so  _ kind, _ it soaked into her bones and at least temporarily soothed the dull red-and-purple ache in her womb.  The cramps were only  _ really  _ bad for the first full day, tomorrow she would just be vaguely, intermittently sore, and it seemed as if that knowledge should make them easier to bear while they lasted, but they still just made her feel wrung out.

If she’d had the energy to look after herself properly last night, to hold a heat pad on her belly or at least take something for the pain, today probably wouldn’t have been as rough.  And Gigi had been right in the chat earlier, masturbation  _ did _ help if you could tolerate the mess; she usually did it in the shower during her period so she didn’t have to tolerate it, but she’d been tired and drunk and only wanted to be in bed.  Where she really wanted to be now, preferably with Jay spooning her and softly rubbing her tummy, but that was not an option.  

She could still hear Jay in the kitchen.  She was a  _ vigorous _ cook who clanked pans and banged cabinet doors and drawers, and she kept humming with occasional bursts of song when, in her head, she reached the chorus.  Eventually she called out, “Ready in like five minutes, babe,” and Holly reluctantly emerged from the water.  She dried herself and dressed again in the familiar sweater and yoga pants.  She still felt misgivings about showing herself in this shlumpy state, but if Jay had seen the worst and wasn’t yet put off, it probably didn’t matter too much.  She would dress up properly for her another time to compensate.

Jay had gone so far as to lay the small table that stood by the balcony windows, and where Holly very seldom ate a meal; she was a couch diner by habit.  She was just carrying over two pasta bowls.  “Holly,” she said, “I’m sorry, but your provisioning sucks.  Did a spice rack traumatise you as a child or something?  I did the best I could but this really needs some chili flakes or paprika or  _ something.” _

“I’m not exactly a domestic goddess,” Holly said sheepishly, sitting down.  “But this looks good.  What do you call it?”

“I call it Jay found some dry spaghetti, an onion and a can of crushed tomatoes and improvised,” Jay said, sitting down and twirling her fork.  “Vovó would be proud.”

“Who’s that?”

“My grandma,” said Jay, fondly.  “It’s Portuguese for grandma — she’s Brazilian.”

“Spaghetti doesn’t seem very Brazilian,” Holly pointed out.  It tasted good to her, anyway.  Honestly she was just grateful to be fed.

“Oh it’s not.  But — okay, Vovó took care of me a lot of the time when I was little so Mom could go to work, and she was pretty big on life skills.  She said it was her job to make sure I could change a tyre, balance a checkbook and make a meal out of whatever I could find in the kitchen.  I use the cooking the most.  I mean, I’ve never had a car and checkbooks aren’t such a thing any more.  I’ll cook you a  _ real _ meal sometime, one of her recipes.  Moqueca de camarão!  It’s a shrimp stew with coconut milk.”

“That sounds like Thai food.  I wonder if it tastes anything like that.”

“See what you think when you eat it.”

“Well, I think  _ this _ is delicious and you’re a darling to make it for me.”

Jay smiled and winked at her, and Holly felt herself turning foolishly, happily red.  She focused on eating while she composed herself a bit.

Then, reluctantly, she had to say, “I have some work I brought home from the office that I have to do tonight.  I won’t be much fun.”

“Jobs that give you homework suck ass,” Jay said sympathetically.  “You need me to clear out so you can concentrate?”

“Well — no, I don’t think I’ll have a problem concentrating, I’ll get the job done.  I’d like you to stay, if you  _ want _ to stay.  I don’t want you to feel any obligation to stay if there’s something you’d rather do.  For the night.  I would like you to stay for the night.  Would you?”

Jay stood up, planted her hands on the tabletop, leaned across it and kissed her cheek.  “Don’t you know I would?  Where are you gonna work?  I can keep out of the way.  Like I  _ should _ keep out of the way because if I’m around you I  _ am _ gonna want to keep touching you and playing with your hair and doofy shit like that, and you won’t get much done.”

“I’ll work in my study.  Oh, I’m so glad you want to stay!  Please just make yourself comfortable, have a bath or watch TV or anything you like.”  

Warm with relief, she helped Jay to stack the dishwasher and got slightly distracted kissing her, leaning up against the counter while waiting for water to boil for her tea.

“Do you have a  _ lot _ to do?” Jay murmured, tucking a loose wisp of Holly’s hair behind her ear.

“Pages and pages,” Holly sighed.  “And I know well begun is half done but ugghhh.”  The kettle began to whistle softly.  “You know it actually is interesting stuff?  Trend prediction, colours for next fall…”  Holly twisted away to turn off the burner and back to Jay.

“Tell them purple and blue.  I like purple and blue.  Am I right?”

“Metallics and iridescents.”  

“Really?  Fuck, I love that, how do you know?”

“A secret cabal of colour mad scientists gives us all our orders.  Well, no, the people at Pantone do press releases, and there’s a lot of market research and psychology behind it.  Ohhh no no no, I mustn’t get distracted.”

“No you mustn’t.”

“Said the girl who’s leaning on me and pinning me to the counter.”

“Pinning you, baby?  I wouldn’t pin you.  Why would I do a bad thing like that?” Jay asked, leaning on her a little harder and nudging her knee in between Holly’s.

“Now stop that,” said Holly, tapping her on the nose and trying to be stern.

“I’ll stop.  I’ll go take a bath like a  _ good _ girl.”

By sheer force of will Holly managed to get herself to the study, sitting down, laptop open, tea ready, annotated report out.  The thought that Jay was undressing in her bathroom was a hell of a distraction.  Only the thought of Ms Diamond’s icy anger if she didn’t have the fall trend report clarified and expanded to her satisfaction was a sufficent antidote.  Holly slapped her cheeks, swigged green tea and made a start.

It was after ten by the time she was sure it was up to scratch, saved it, printed it out and clipped the pages in a crisp blue folder.  She stood, stretched her arms above her head, pressed her hands into the small of her back and arched it.  The cramps weren’t sharp any more but she was still  _ so  _ achy and tired.  It wasn’t fair; she wanted to protest childishly that she’d been  _ good. _  She put the laptop and folder safely in her briefcase for the morning and went out to the living room where Jay was lying on the couch with damp, curly hair, wrapped in Holly’s fluffy bathrobe and watching some kind of space cartoon with a lot of lasers and shouting _. _

“Heyyy,” she said, looking up.  “All done?”  She pulled up her feet to make room for Holly at the end of the seat.

“Yes, thank goodness,” Holly said, flopping down.  “What  _ are _ you watching?”

_ “Voltron,”  _ Jay said, pausing it.

“That’s not — oh.  Does anyone do  _ anything _ except remakes and reboots now?” Holly asked, disgruntled.

“What, were you a huge fan of the original?  Wouldn’t’ve picked you for a giant robots girl.”

“I was not.”

“I gotcha, you were into  _ My Little Pony.   _ But  _ that’s _ a pretty good remake, right?  It’s cute, it’s funny, it’s all about girls being friends, the fanboys are fuckin’ horrifying but that’s not the ponies’ fault.”

“I don’t know that much about it.  I mean, I don’t watch cartoons  _ now.” _

“But you know you  _ can,  _ right?  The Adult Police won’t kick down the door and revoke your licence.”  Jay sat up and draped her arm around Holly’s shoulders.  “Gonna corrupt you with sex and drugs and  _ cartoons.” _

“I’m too tired for any corruption tonight,” Holly said.  She rocked her head over to rest against Jay’s shoulder; it was so  _ comforting _ and she felt so  _ spoiled _ and as if something this precious could vanish in a minute; when you didn’t understand how you’d lucked into something you were always aware that you could ruin it with just as little understanding of how  _ that _ happened.

“It  _ does  _ take it out of ya.  You want to go to bed now, babe?”  Jay stroked Holly’s cheek with the backs of her curled fingers, and Holly felt a flutter of feverish warmth go through her even through the fatigue.  

“Yes, please.”

It felt strange to go through the ready-for-bed routine with someone else there, to be enjoying it but trying not to get too attached to it, not to drift into rose-tinted domestic daydreams of two toothbrushes leaning companionably together in a glass.  She told herself not to be weird and anachronistic and found a refill head for her electric toothbrush for Jay to use, and while she was cleaning her teeth, found pyjamas for her to wear.  They were not the silk pair from the other night (someone had spilled beer on them and apart from putting them in a bucket to soak she hadn’t done anything about that yet) but a cosy flannelette set with a pattern of duck egg blue and caramel brown stripes.  She supposed she was sending a message with that, wanting Jay to be comfortable but acknowledging the unsexiness of the occasion.  She put on her own cotton nightdress while Jay was still in the bathroom, caught sight of herself in the mirror, felt hopelessly frumpy and crawled into bed where she was decently covered up.  

Jay, being entirely unconcerned with decent covering, came out into the bedroom in the bathrobe, saw the pyjamas lying ready for her on the side of the bed, said, “Sweet, thanks Holly,” and stripped the bathrobe straight off to put them on.  Holly lay there staring at her golden-brown nakedness with wide eyes until it was hidden as quickly and practically as the robe had been taken off.  Jay hopped into bed beside her and snuggled down, and Holly realised she needed to shuffle over and yield half the space to her, not lie smack in the middle of the bed the way she habitually did.

“Oh wait,” said Jay, “need to charge my phone.”  She rolled back out of bed and went off to the living room for her backpack, came back with it, dug out a charger and plugged it in, laying the phone in its purple rubber jacket on the nightstand next to Holly's sleek silver one on its dock, a more modern symbol to take the place of the toothbrushes, perhaps.  “There,” she said, climbing back in, “all set for real this time.  Unless I need to pee again?   Nah, I think I'm good.”  She rolled onto her side to face Holly.  “You’re being pretty quiet.  Are you just sleepy, or…”  She trailed off on a vaguely interrogative rising note.  

“I’m so happy to have you here,” Holly admitted, “but I don't know how to behave.  I’ve honestly never had a girlfriend who spent the night.  I know how absolutely pathetic that sounds but I can't do anything about it now.”

“You really mean never?” Jay asked.  She sounded puzzled but mercifully not scornful.  

“I don't think someone staying over in my dorm room at college is the same thing.  That was more just ending up there after a party, not  _ coming over _ with intent to stay.”

“Oh okay, so you're drawing the line between a hook-up and a  _ premeditated  _ sleepover?”  Jay propped her elbow on the pillow and her head on her hand.   _ “Nothing  _ since then?”

“Not by design, but nothing that meant anyone stayed with me.”

“The only way it makes sense is if you’ve been really shy and maybe not realised when people liked you,” said Jay, “because fuck, you’re so cute and sexy and generous and sweet…”

“When I’m not being a snobby bitch,” Holly pointed out.

“You got layers,” Jay said with a crooked smile.  “Hey, anyway, the way you’re behaving here is fine.  Try not to worry about that.  Also a minute ago did you just call me your  _ girlfriend?” _

Holly’s face bloomed hot.  “I didn’t mean — I — not if you don’t  _ want _ me to.”  

_ “Yes _ I want you to.  You have my complete, total,  _ explicit  _ consent to call me your girlfriend any old time you want.  Gratuitously.  In public.”  Jay pulled her close and kissed her cheek with a smack.  “You’re an overachiever, Holls.  Went from no GF to a whole tribe of ‘em.  Hey, any preference for how we sleep?  You got the side of the bed you want?”

“Um, yes, thank you.”

“So polite, Miss Holly.  Spoon you?”

“Yes  _ please. _  And will you — here.”  She found Jay’s hand on her hip and brought it over to rest on her lower belly where the ache lingered.

“Got you.  Good night, baby.”  Jay kissed the back of her neck and snuggled down.  Holly reached up to the switch over the bedhead to snap off the light.

“Good night, dear Jay,” she said, and tried to settle down to sleep.  

She had the same problem she’d had on the train.  She felt bloated and crampy and she was seeping blood in a way she found deeply icky, she was wearing her largest and plainest underpants and a long-tailed overnight pad, she herself was surely at her least sexy ever, but Jay was close to her and touching her and smelling like warm clean skin and jojoba bath oil and there was no way in the world Holly could sleep like this.  

_ Come on, _ she scolded herself.   _ Jay is a sweet kind person who is taking care of you when there’s no possibility of any kind of payoff.  Try to get onto her level and just appreciate her kindness instead of lying here  _ seething with lust _ like some sort of  _ teenage boy.   _ Think unsexy thoughts.  Think  _ calm _ thoughts.  Picture the ocean on a still day when the surface of the water looks like blue-grey silk and it perfectly reflects the sky.   _

Jay drifted across the surface of the water on an inflatable raft in a little white bikini.  

_ Picture snow, deep and crisp and even, freshly fallen with not even a bird’s tiny footprints on it, pure and  _ cold.  

Jay would look adorable in furry earmuffs and Holly could feel the cold tip of her nose against her cheek while her warm soft lips kissed her mouth and her slick wet tongue stroked its way between  _ her  _ lips.

Jay’s hand — her actual hand as opposed to a fantasy hand, startling her — moved on her belly, giving a gentle oval rub.  “Are you okay?” she murmured.  “You feel really tense.  Still hurting?”

“Still… not used to sharing a bed.  But I do want you to stay here.”

“At least we’ve done it once before.  And that was nice, right?  Even allowing for the hangover next morning.”

“True, but I had  _ substances _ helping me relax.”

“Yeah, alas, I did not bring weed.  We can do the whole sleepover, share secrets, talk till you drop off thing.”

“What should we talk about?”   _ Oh God, I’m going to bore her.  I don’t have any remotely interesting secrets. _

“Mmm… how about your hair?”

“What about my hair?”

“You ever think about putting any other colours in here?  Something fun?”

“Blondes have more fun.  Or so they say.  That was the idea.”

“Well, you’re… an  _ elective _ blonde.  Yeah?”

“Yes.  My real hair is just mousy and boring.”

“Hey.  I’ve got brown hair too.”  Jay nudged the back of Holly’s thigh with her knee.

“Which you dye pink and purple, so obviously you were bored with it too.”

“I mean, you’ve bleached it already, you wouldn’t need to lighten it a lot more to get the yellow tones out and then you could do pastels.  Or some really vivid brights!  Iridescents.  The hot trend for… yeah, we’re way too early for fall but you can be ahead of the times.”

“I… don’t think I could pull that off.  You could.  You  _ should.” _

“The pastels would be really pretty on you.  Like those soft blues and mauves.”

“I would look like a blue-rinsed grandma.”

“Holly!  You have skin like a fuckin’ peach.  You’re not gonna look like a grandma when you  _ are _ a grandma.  You’ll be a total silver fox but you’re nowhere near that yet.”  She gave another nudge with her knee.  “Don’t fast-forward your life.”

“Change of subject, change of subject.  Um.  Still on hair.  Your hair.”

“Ask me anything.”  Jay cuddled her waist.

“Well, I hope this isn’t a rude question.  I wondered why you shave your legs but not under your arms.  I don’t want you to change it!  I just wondered if there’s a particular reason.”

“Oh.  I only do the legs up to the knee ‘cuz I like how it feels.  Smooth like a dolphin!  Plus I don’t like how it looks when the little hairs stick through my tights.  My pits are really sensitive and if I shave ‘em they get all sore and rashy no matter what I do, and I way prefer a nice soft hairy pussy to a stubbly itchy one, God.  There’s an _element_ of saying fuck you to fuckin’ patriarchal Eurocentric beauty standards but the biggest thing is it’s way more comfortable.”  She snickered.  “I went with this girl in high school and she was like, why are you so hairy, I thought you were Brazilian, and I was like, a quarter and we don’t _have_ to wax, it’s not a law, and she was like why would you need to wax, and it turned out she somehow thought all Brazilian chicks were _naturally_ hairless and the wax was supposed to make you _look_ _like_ a Brazilian.  She was on the honor roll!  The moral of the story is no one’s smart about everything.”

“I’m impressed you found a moral in a story about pubic hair.”

“Me too.  Hey, I like yours.  It’s really soft.”

“Sharky says it’s like a kitten.”

Jay smothered a giggle against Holly’s shoulder.  “She’s weird, but she’s not wrong.”  She followed the giggle with a little sigh.  “It’s not easy lying here touching you and  _ not _ petting the kitty.  It’ll be good when you’re feeling better.”

“Um… I don’t want to establish a precedent for calling touching my pussy petting the kitty, I find that a little too weird.  But if you want to…”

“No, baby, only when you want it too.”

“I do want it, it’s just so  _ gross.”   _ Holly pressed her burning face into the pillow.  Jay was quiet, her thumb stroking lightly against Holly’s belly the way it had been through the whole conversation.  

“Well,” she said eventually, “when there’s something you find gross or uncomfortable sometimes that’s just a sign it’s not the right thing for you and there’s no reason you should do it.  Fuck it, right?  And sometimes it’s something you could  _ get _ comfortable with and there’s something in it for you if you do.  Only you can really figure out which one it is, and I’ve got you either way.”

“Is there anything that’s too gross or uncomfortable for  _ you _ to do?” Holly asked desperately.

“Well, I love how anal  _ feels _ but I get all squeamish if I smell poo, so that’s tricky sometimes.  But I know part of why I love anal is how dirty it feels and how hot it is that I’m using my ass for sex, like ooh, naughty, and I think it’s kind of silly to feel that way but on the other hand I really get off to it so… whatever.  You’re totally allowed to have mixed feelings about a thing but still want to do it.  Fuck, didn’t you have mixed feelings about getting with us?”  She paused.  “Unless you’re really irregular and skip months we  _ must’ve _ felt you up while you had your period.  Were you okay with that?”

“In the early stages through all my clothes.  That was a different proposition from exposing you to my… mess.”

“Hey, we can put down a towel.  Plus you said about your waterproof mattress topper.  Any mess we can clean up.  Buuuut no pressure, no pressure,” Jay concluded sheepishly.  “You don't have to make up your mind right  _ now _ .  I'm hoping we're together for a lot more periods than this.  Okay, that just sounds weird.”

“I just can't face doing something that might generate laundry tonight when I'm already tired,” Holly admitted.  “And it feels so pathetic that that's what it comes down to, not passion or desire but  _ laundry _ .”

“Tired is a good reason too,” Jay said.  “I’m tired too.  Spent all day moving boxes up and down stairs, but the pay wasn't bad.  That bath felt so good.”

“I — I’m proud of you for working so hard,” Holly said, feeling guilty that it had never occurred to her that Jay might be suffering from sore muscles or really from anything.  She'd only thought about herself.   _ Well, I'm going to make up for that.  I’ll spoil her with treats and presents.   _

“Paid us cash in hand so I got new kicks finally, yay,” Jay went on, unwittingly dismaying her more.   _ No, don't be stupid, this just means she’ll have two new pairs and mine will still be special.  Mine will be  _ beautiful _ , after all.   _

“That's wonderful.  Um, Jay?”

“Hmm?”  Jay sounded drowsy now. 

“You said you wanted us to take care of each other, and you took such good care of me tonight, but… if there's anything else like this will you tell me so I can try to take care of you too?”

“Letting me soak the aches out in that awesome tub and sleep in this great big luxury bed is taking care of me.”

“No, but — well, I can't claim to be as good at massage as Gigi but the Bodywand does in fact work as a massager anywhere on the body.  Not just as a euphemism.”

“Aww, you’re the best, Holls.”  Jay wrapped her arms around her waist and squeezed briefly before subsiding to the former cosy nestling with her hand on Holly's tummy.  Soon her breathing grew softer and slower, and Holly thought she was asleep.  She wished she was.  

She felt ashamed of being ashamed of her body and annoyed with herself for the whole thing.  Of course  _ Jay _ wasn’t.  Of course  _ Jay _ had had girlfriends in high school and slept with them easily and happily.  Of course  _ Jay _ had always known how she felt and understood what it meant.   _ Stop it, stop it, you’re getting mean, you’re resenting a sweet girl who’s good to you.  It’s not her  _ fault _ she’s happier and more confident than you ever were, she’s not doing it to  _ spite _ you. _

_ I was on the honor roll.  Wonder if she’d have liked me.  Ha!  I would have been absolutely terrified of her. _

_ And now she’s cuddling me… and breathing softly behind me… and she’ll still be here tomorrow. _

 

The alarm woke her with a jolt and a twitch, and she slapped blindly at the light switch above the headboard.  After a few moment’s pained blinking she was able to keep her eyes open enough to stare owlishly at Jay’s face, equally startled.  Jay pushed back a sheaf of pinkish-purplish hair and rolled over to look at the blinking face of Holly’s phone in the dock.  She grunted softly and rolled back to wrap her arms around Holly and rub her cheek against her breasts.

“We got time,” she mumbled, her voice a husky, sleepy growl.

“What for?”

“Jus’... time.”

“Five minutes?” Holly asked, reaching over to dab at the snooze button.

“Fi’minnit,” Jay agreed.  Holly wrapped her arms around her shoulders and rested her cheek on top of her head.  She felt an almost painful tenderness towards her and an utter contentment that she suspected wouldn’t last more than these five minutes, so she leaned right into it now, before the day began.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Pearls! The name Marguerite actually means pearl (as does Margaret and all the variants thereof) and Blauw is Dutch for blue. Yelena just sounds vaguely like yellow and yeah. They're there, though. 
> 
> At this point Jay is wife goals, Sharky is the ideal mistress and Chip's just happy to be there.


	7. Chapter 7

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Fair warning, not a lot _happens_ in this chapter, it's mostly just characters talking and getting to know each other better and discussing plans. I've been stalled on this story for such a long time that I'm just trying to get it moving again. I'm also trying something evilsnotbag suggested and using different colours to make it clearer who's speaking in text conversations.  
>  ETA: well I TRIED but it didn't show up when I posted. Oh well.  
> ETFA: worked out what I'd done wrong in CSS, enjoy the glorious colour-coding.

Holly had been a little concerned that trying to get ready for the day alongside Jay would make her late, but through surprising synchronicity and some fluke reversal of that strange time loss that sometimes happened in the bathroom, they were out the door with time to spare.  She couldn’t quite believe it.  

“Did I somehow forget to put on half my clothes?” she asked Jay in the elevator.  “Do I have no make-up on?”

“Oh pscht,” said Jay.  “Your eyeliner is flawless and your lips are like maraschino cherries.  Plus your undies are all silky and comfy.”  She gave her hips an appreciative swivel.  “Thanks for the loaners.  We should just keep switching till you have all my underwear and I have all yours.”

“I  _ will _ get those back to you, I’m  _ very  _ behind on laundry.”  Holly slipped her arm around Jay’s waist and tucked her hand into her jeans pocket.  “Thank you.  You’ve made everything better.”

_ “Of _ course.  Your shoes match too.  See?  I basically fixed your life by sleeping over.”

There was time to stop for coffee and even to order for the others; Holly managed to get Jay’s order right, Sharky’s, Skinny’s and Chip’s before running dry and turning to her for help.  After that they had to scurry down to the subway, just in time.

And then, despite still having her period, despite it still being in its heavy stage, it was  _ a good day. _  She found some Advil she had forgotten in the back of a desk drawer and that worked much better on her cramps than the emergency purse Tylenol she’d been making do with.  She left the revised report on Marguerite’s desk with an explanatory Post-It note on which, after careful thought and a few drafts on scratch paper, she had drawn what she hoped was recognisable as Marguerite as a butterfly.  Then she got her act together sufficiently to write a grocery list, including all the period survival supplies that she only ever remembered she had run out of when the next period hit, and placed her order online for delivery at home that night, and felt very organised and shit-together compared with her recent piss-poor performance.   _ Adulting, _ she thought, and then shook her head at herself but smiled at the way their jokes had taken up residence in her vocabulary.

That seemed to set the tone for the day; there was nothing she couldn’t deal with, she was in place on time, and during her lunch break she got out of the office and successfully bought Carnie’s present.  She had managed not to catch on until she saw it that a Nintendo Switch was a console that you used with a TV set, not really that much different from her childhood NES — all right, infinitely better graphics and sound and everything else but still, you attached it to the TV and kept it at home, and she happened to know that Carnie and Skinny were looking for a new place to live at the moment because their roommate was moving her boyfriend in and neither of them could abide him.  Of course the Switch could live at Holly’s place but that didn’t seem like much of a present for  _ Carnie. _

After some deliberation she chose a 3DS instead, partly because it had a lovely purple galaxy pattern on its case, and  _ Pokémon Sun and Moon  _ because that felt like an extremely safe choice.  She suffered a moment of intense humiliation when the store clerk assumed she was buying it for her son or daughter, and couldn’t quite work out why that bothered her so much.  She was a perfectly normal age to have a child of video-game playing age and the assumption implied that she  _ could _ have a husband even if she didn’t personally  _ want _ one.  Maybe it was because despite being old enough to have a child big enough for video games, she’d never had so much as a skipped period and was clearly into the age range where starting now would become difficult (but she didn’t think she  _ wanted _ to so that was an odd thing to care about); maybe it was just that her hormones were making her weirdly sensitive.

When she got back to the office there was a note on her desk, “She liked it!  She may not say so but she looked impressed, M,” with a doodle of Holly as a fluffy Persian cat.  That was… nice.  Odd.  Nice.  She wasn’t sure if Marguerite was turning into a friend or what.  It was hard to imagine her alongside the girls, even if she and Ella clearly shared at least one interest.  Oh God, no, she should definitely just cultivate Marguerite as a work friend, she could  _ not _ imagine it being healthy for her career to have that relationship widely known.

The one flaw in a very satisfactory day came about four o’clock when she got a text from Sharky.

**_Sorry boo we won’t see u tonight — gotta help a friend move_ **

**_Short notice I know but she’s getting out of a shitty abusive clusterfuck thing n we trying to get her out b4 they come home might also be a bodyguard type job!_ **

**_sorry_ **

_ No, I understand.  I’m proud of you for helping her.   _ Pretty disappointed, but also proud.  They were such  _ good _ girls and if she hadn’t got to know them it would never have occurred to her that they would be so thoughtful and caring.

**_make up for it next time_ ** _ ( ͡° ͜ʖ ͡°) _

_ Does she have a place lined up to go to?  If not I could help with a hotel room.   _

**_aww ♡ thanks but she’s gonna get on the train 2 her sister in Philly, just gonna stick with her till then_ **

_ Then she should be very safe. _

She tried to resign herself to an early night, telling herself it would be good for her, she needed the sleep.  She was lying in bed, hugging the pillow Jay had slept on and left smelling faintly of J’adore and Batiste, when she heard the buzzer.  That was weird; her first reaction was that there must be some kind of emergency, perhaps an evacuation, perhaps terrorists, perhaps she was spiralling and needed to calm the fuck down.  She scurried out of her bedroom and pressed the button.

“Yes?  What?”

“I’m sorry to disturb you, Ms Agate, but there’s a person here who says she knows you.”  For a few moments Holly was baffled; who was this?   _ Oh, _ the new doorman.  He had only started on Monday after two weeks with the lobby unattended since his predecessor had up and disappeared.  Very earnest and recently ex-military; Holly had blanked on his name as soon as she met him.  “Are you expecting a Ms Sharky?”

“Oh.   _ Oh! _  Yes, she’s a good friend.”  She could hear a voice say “Told ya” in the background.

“You can always tell me when you’re expecting guests, ma’am,” he said reproachfully, his tone implying not “can” but “should.”

“Thank you, I will, just send her on up,” Holly said quickly.

When she opened the door she realised Sharky looked more than usually disreputable; her knuckles were scuffed and she had a fresh bruise on her cheekbone, but she was grinning and walked in with a swagger.

“Who’s the dick on the door?”she asked, slinging her arms around Holly’s waist and pulling her in for a kiss.

“I can’t remember his name,” Holly admitted.  “He’s new.  You’re right, he’s a dick.  Why are you here?  What happened to your poor face?  Did your mission of mercy go wrong?”

“No, no, it went great.  Got her out of there safe and sound  _ and  _ got to punch a dude in a righteous cause.  This wasn’t even him!”  She gestured at her cheek.  “Gigi donked me by accident with a suitcase, getting it into the overhead rack.  Samsonite’s nothing to fuck with.  As for why I’m here?  First aid, baby.  Need you to kiss it better.”

“Won’t that just hurt?” Holly fretted.

“Yes, but I am very tough.”  Sharky presented her cheek and Holly kissed it very lightly and carefully.

“And why did you come here?  All by yourself?  Let me put some ice on that.”

“I already iced it with a soda can, I’m good.  And what, I can’t decide to drop in on my girlfriend?”  Sharky dropped her a wink.  “I’m on girlfriend tier too, right?”

“Of course you are.  I just didn’t expect you — well, obviously, look at the state of me.”  She’d been too surprised and flustered to be embarrassed at first.

“I’m seeing cute PJs, so the state of you looks good.”  She slid her hands down to cup Holly’s bottom through the paisley-pattern pants.  “Jay’s been walking on air all day and I dunno, I kind of wanted a Holly sleepover of my own, but only if it’s cool with you.”

“You’re such a gracious guest, inviting yourself.”  She wrapped her arms around Sharky’s shoulders, though.  “Why did you tell him your name was Ms Sharky?”

Sharky paused, then said, “... my name  _ is _ Ms Sharky.”

“I’ve never entirely understood how you get Sharky from Cherlindrea but I assumed it was a reference to your dangerous smile.”

“It’s my  _ name,  _ Holly, it’s my family name.  It’s Irish.”  Sharky laughed.  “I mean, I’m obviously Irish, right?  That’s why Door Dick didn’t wanna let me up to see you.  People can be so prejudiced.”

“Oh,” said Holly, feeling foolish.

“I can’t believe you found out my first name is Cherlindrea and you didn’t realise Sharky’s my second name.”  There was the dangerous smile, teasing her.

“It’s not as if I looked at your ID,” Holly mumbled.  “I was just overhearing.”

“You were eavesdropping, Miss Holly.”  Sharky squeezed her bottom.  “Hey, I looked it up once when we did family tree projects in grade school.  I was hoping it literally meant shark person, but it means loving or beloved.  Also most people spell it with an E before the Y, but fuck most people, am I right?”

“Does it really?  That’s adorable.  What does Cherlindrea mean?”

“It means my mom is really weird and loves this 80s fantasy movie called  _ Willow,  _ and Cherlindrea’s kind of a fairy princess in that.  It’s like she named me Knock-off Galadriel,” Sharky said sheepishly.  “But my family mostly just call me Cher.”

“I remember  _ Willow! _  Vaguely.”

“Yeah, everyone  _ assumes _ it’s just a made-up ghetto name, but let the record show, it is a made-up  _ enchanted forest _ name.”

“You don’t need to be embarrassed,” Holly said, then backpedalled.   _ “Are _ you embarrassed?  I hope I’m not patronising you thinking you might be embarrassed.  But it’s a pretty name, and if your mother named you after something she loves, that’s very sweet.  My mother named me after a movie too!  Holly Golightly in  _ Breakfast at Tiffany’s. _  She was probably hoping I’d turn out a bit more Audrey Hepburn than I did,” Holly concluded with an awkward shrug.

“Oh,” Sharky said, her face clearing.  “Well, that’s okay, because I sure didn’t turn out to be no fairy princess.”

“I like how you turned out.”

“I like how  _ you _ turned out.”  They stood still a few moments, smiling at each other a little foolishly in their mutual liking, before Sharky remembered she was a badass and kissed Holly deeply and a bit roughly, diving in with her tongue.  It left her a little dizzy.

“Have you eaten?”

“I could.”  Sharky waggled her eyebrows.

“Oh, that actually wasn’t an innuendo, I still have my period and I really wondered if you need something to eat before bed.  I — I’m sorry.”

“Oh my God, you caught Jay’s mom friend germs.  Also, you know I don’t care about your period, right?  Well, not  _ don’t care.  _  It’s not a deal-breaker, is all.”

“Sorry.  Sorry, not ready.  But very happy to make you a sandwich,” said Holly hopefully.  “Something to drink?  Dessert?”

“Okay, this is going in a weirdly milfy direction,” said Sharky.  “Not that I mind.  Whatcha got for dessert?”

“Ummm, maple walnut ice cream or white chocolate and macadamia cookies.”

“Wow, Jay said you had like a Kraft single and a bean when she stayed over.”

“Jay did not see my catering at its finest.  Also, Kraft singles?  Ew.”

In the end they both had the cookies with hot cocoa, curled up together at one end of the little couch.  

“Damn, this is nice,” said Sharky.  “And you know, maybe it’s a good thing you’re not DTF tonight, ‘cuz I was hoping you wanted to talk about our whole D/s thing and it’s better to do that when you’re not gonna dive straight in and do it.  Gives you time to think and change your mind if you want to.”

“Why?  Do you think I’m going to change my mind?”  Holly tucked her feet up under her, leaning against Sharky’s side.

Sharky shrugged her free shoulder.  “I get the feeling this shit is new for you, so I just wanna make it easy.  Is it?  New?  Or you a sub from way back?”

“It’s new.  I think you  _ know _ it’s new.  Most things about my relationship with all of you are new,” she admitted.

“Okay.”

“And — and I’m afraid you’ll think what I want to do is ridiculous.  Or too tame and boring.”

“Aw, c’mon.  It’s not like ‘you must be this kinky to ride.’  You can start wherever.  I just wanna fool around with you and try stuff out.  First things first, you read  _ Fifty Shades of Grey?” _

“No.   _ Ew.” _  She gave that even more venom than the Kraft singles.

“That’s my girl.  Shitty, shitty book.  It is  _ not _ like that.  I mean, I think so many people think it’s about the dom getting to do whatever they want to the sub and the sub just taking it?  That’s ass-backward.  If you’re doing it right the sub’s really in charge because  _ you _ figure out what kind of an experience you want and then I try and give it to you.  Plus obvs you choose how far we go and you can call pause or stop any time.  That’s important, okay?  I need you to promise you.   _ Will. _  Tell me if you wanna stop or take a break.  I’ll be watching out for you and checking in but I can’t read your mind.  That’s my ground rule.  Talk to me.”

“It is… difficult sometimes to talk  _ coherently _ when…”  Holly trailed off.

“So that’s what safe words are for.  You use that word and you don’t have to explain anything, be coherent or shit, I’ll just stop and make sure you’re okay.  That’s really simple.  I don’t ever wanna take it too far and wreck it for you.”

“But you’re making it sound as if you’re just doing something for me and it’s not… anything for you.”

“Oh, no-no-no.”  Sharky waved her half-eaten cookie emphatically.  “Different people come at it from different angles but what  _ I  _ am into is you trusting me —  that is a  _ huge _ thing to me — and seeing the  _ reactions _ I can get out of you and honestly?  Seeing you lose it while I stay in control.  Taking you somewhere you can’t get to on your own and bringing you back safe.”

“Do you mean your kink is  _ responsibility?” _

Sharky chuckled.  “I’m a freak.  And yours is… hmm… you’ve got a little shame thing but you also wanna know you’re a  _ good _ girl.  It’s so cute.  I think it’s gonna be really fun playing both sides of that.”

Holly looked into her cup and swirled the dregs to mix the settled cocoa back into the milk.  “What kind of thing would we do?”

“Up to you,” said Sharky.  “There’s nothing it  _ has  _ to be.  It can be how I talk to you.  It can be restraints, it can be sensory stuff like blindfolding you.  It can be like… getting you to do dares, like no undies all day and you text me about what it’s doing for you.  There’s a million kinds of roleplay stuff, we can act out a little scene, or you can be my pet and act like a little kittycat, or — oh!  You were so  _ proud  _ about taking that big fat dildo Saturday, I was thinking you might really enjoy pussy training, bigger things, little by little, working those muscles too.”  She gently poked Holly’s shoulder.  “Jay would be proud of you.”

“Um,” Holly said, flushing warm.  “Well, that gives me a lot to think about.”

“And all of that is stuff I like.  Just take your time and plan out something you wanna try, and when you’ve got your idea you can talk me through it and we’ll figure out how to make it happen.”  She finished her cocoa with an appreciative slurp.

“But what if I wanted to do something you  _ didn’t _ like?”

“Well, some things I’ll do for you anyway ‘cuz they don’t bother me, I just don’t care about ‘em.  Other things I’ll say nah, I’m not into that.  Or some things I might say let’s wait till we know each other better, I’ve got a feel for your reactions and your endurances, that way it’s easier to judge if I can pull it off.”

“You really  _ are _ responsible about this.”

“Well, don’t  _ tell _ anyone, you’ll ruin my badass image.”  Sharky grinned and popped her tongue out between her teeth.  “You got anything in mind already?  Or you wanna sit on it a little longer?”

“Sit on it,” Holly said firmly.  Sharky waggled her eyebrows and made her giggle.

Sharky wanted the other side of the bed to Jay, and she snooped in Holly’s closet while she was cleaning her teeth a second time to get rid of the sour-milk cocoa aftertaste and pulled a college teeshirt Holly hadn’t worn in years to wear as a nightshirt.  The hem only just skimmed the underside of her bottom when she was standing up.

“You’re trying to tempt me,” Holly pointed out as she slipped into bed beside her.  

“You bet I am,” said Sharky, flipping up the shirt to flash her.

“Is that new?” Holly asked, startled.

“Oh, this?” said Sharky.  There was a cluster of scarlet stars over her hipbone.  “Chip drew it on me to try it out.  You like?”

“It looks gorgeous.”  Holly bit her lip.  “I’m still thinking about that.  She wants to do a morning glory vine around my thigh but don’t you think that would just call attention to where I’m fat?”

“Um, excuse you, the word is thicc, two c’s, and it’s a good thing.  I mean, it’ll probably hurt like fuck because I happen to know you’re very sensitive on the inner thigh, but I dunno.  Would holding still for Chip while she hurts you to make your skin all pretty be kind of a buzz for you?”  Sharky rolled onto her side facing Holly, propping her head on her folded arm on the pillow.

“Um,” said Holly.  She scooted down in bed and pulled the covers up over her shoulder.  “Maybe.”

“I’ll hold your hand while you’re in the chair,” Sharky said.  “I’m great moral support.  Or immoral.  Eether-eyther.”

“I’m thinking about it.”

“That’s my girl,” said Sharky, and kissed her on the forehead.  “You think about my thing too and we’ll have a whole lot of fun when you’re done.”

“I…  _ have _ been thinking about it.  Do you think I could pull off that thing you said about playing your pet?”

“Wouldn’t’ve suggested it if I didn’t.”

“So I mean… would I need to wear a cat  _ costume?” _  Holly lowered her voice.  “Is this like those furry people on the internet?”

Sharky chuckled.  “It’s only as furry as you want it to be.  Like, what would you need to wear to get into character?  Could be a full bodysuit, could be just a kitty ears headband.”

“I used to pretend I was a cat when I was little with socks over my hands to make them like paws,” Holly said with a faint snort.

“Oh my god that’s so cute.”

“It was a little weird.”

“Nope, nope, just cute.”

“I don’t want to wear socks over my hands  _ now,  _ I hasten to add.”  Holly rolled onto her back and looked up at the ceiling.  “Is there anything  _ you _ would like me to wear?  I know you’re saying it depends on me but I’d like to look good to  _ you.” _

“Socks!  Not over your hands but if you’re being a kitty, long socks, like thigh-high, that’d be neat.  Little bell collar.  Fluffy tail on a buttplug.”

“Are you serious?” Holly asked, arching one eyebrow.  She’d always been slightly proud of her ability to raise one eyebrow by itself and no one had ever commented on it as much as she would like, which was to say at all.  

“You know I like playing with your ass, and I’m pretty sure you like it too.  Am I wrong?  You gotta tell me if I’m wrong.”

“You’re not wrong.  I’m… getting used to liking that.”

“Yeah you are.  Attagirl.”  To Holly’s surprise, Sharky pulled her into a hug.  “I know this might sound weird to say when we’re talking about sticking things up your ass, but I feel really proud of you when you let yourself get into something new.  ‘Cuz when we met you, you were so uptight I could’ve stuffed some coal up your ass and you would’ve shat out a diamond.”

Holly gave a startled laugh.  “Sharky!”

“Too gross?  Okay.  How’s this?  You were like a tight, pinched-up little bud, and I can see you blooming into a big, open, beautiful slutty flower.  And I’m proud of you, girl!”

“Oh, I’m a flower, am I?”

“You’re a morning glory, baby.”  Sharky reached one hand down and gave her bottom a squeeze.

“Um… so… would I sort of cat around?  Would you stroke me and skritch me under the chin?”

“That works.  Feed you treats, play with you, tell you what a good kitty you are… unless of course you’re a bad kitty.  I can give you punishments if you want.  I’m partial to a good hard spanking.  Not like you can spank a  _ cat. _  Well, you  _ could _ but you’d feel like such a  _ dick.” _

“I’ll give it some thought,” Holly said.  

“Also, I just thought of this, and slap me if you hate the pun, but what if we  _ combined _ the kitty game with pussy training?”

“Oh my god,” Holly muttered, but she snickered appreciatively.

“That could be how you earn your kitty treats.”

“I’ll also consider that.”

“Although, word of warning?  If you look online to get ideas, there’s so fuckin’ much stuff that’s just misogynistic and mean and… damn, I dunno, once again dudes ruin the fun.”

“I think I’m prepared for that based on how hard it is to find something labelled ‘lesbian’ that’s actually  _ of lesbians _ and intended to appeal  _ to lesbians.” _

“True that.”

They both fell quiet for a while, curled together in the middle of the bed, Sharky’s hand stroking slightly up and down at the small of Holly’s back until it slowed to a stop.

“Tell you something?” Sharky said at length.

“Hmm?”

“This may shock you.”

“Go on.”

“I like being the little spoon.  Can we do that?”

“Oh!  Yes.”

“I mean, the trade-off is you get my ass in your lap, that’s a pretty sweet deal.”  She rolled over and Holly snuggled up behind her before reaching up to switch off the light.

“Good night, Miss Cherlindrea Sharky.”

“Night, Holly.”

A few seconds passed in the warm darkness.

“Do you have a middle name?”

“I’ll never tell.”


	8. Chapter 8

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Okay, I think maybe finally I've broken through the dry spell on this story? No guarantees, but at least I got it moving again.

The rest of the week passed less eventfully, but Holly was getting increasingly excited and keyed up for the weekend.  Things she’d ordered kept arriving; she was busy wrapping presents (there had to be fancy wrappings or what was the  _ point) _ and planning her menu and repeatedly changing her mind about what to wear.  That was fancy wrapping too.

The fridge was loaded with champagne and beer and the most vividly orange soda she could find.  The pantry was full of snacks and treats ranging from equally vivid orange cheese puffs to handmade Belgian chocolate truffles.  With the air mattresses and extra blankets she had laid in there should be a comfortable place for everyone to sleep, and assuming they could drag themselves out of bed Sunday morning she would be able to offer them strawberries, toast, yoghurt, eggs and/or bacon for breakfast.  

Her period had finally fucked off conclusively by the end of Friday and she celebrated by taking some nice bathtub photos for the girls; she tried an artistic touch by floating flowers on the water.

**_Sharky:  that’s my morning glory_ **

_ Chip:  r u calling her a boner _

**_Sharky:  yes.  yes I am literally calling Holly my boner._ **

_ Gigi:  calling her a boner is more like you than calling her a flower tbh _

**_Sharky:  fuck all yall I can be as tender and romantic as the next bitch_ **

_ Chip:  u stole the morning glories from me tho _

**_Sharky:  sorry Chippy they were just so good I had to, ur game is legendary, lesser artists borrow, great artists steal_ **

_ Chip: ur lucky I love u asshole _

**_Sharky:  ur the next tender romantic bitch I was referring to <3<3<3_ **

She was settling into bed, feeling warm and soft and florally scented (which was a wonderful change from feeling achy and sticky and sure she smelled like bad meat) when another text came through from Jay.

_ I can’t stop thinking about tomorrow night.  Party at Holly’s place.  This is gonna be lit.  I miss your bed. _

_ It’s a nice bed. _

_ It’s the company <3 _

_ Everything will be better prepared this time too.  I think you’ll approve. _

_ If I can walk right in and pick you up again that’s good enough for me. _

_ You are  _ really  _ strong. _

_ Well I work at it but you’re a marshmallow.   _

_ Pink and white? _

_ And sweet and soft. _

_ I’m definitely heavier than a marshmallow.  Even a me-size marshmallow. _

_ Shhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh. _

_ That’s a lot of h’s. _

_ That’s how much I care.  Good night baby.  One more sleep <3 _

On Saturday she suffered from having everything ready too soon and not knowing what to do until she could expect them to arrive.  The gifts were safely hidden in the study; she wouldn’t bring them out until Chip joined them, so they could all be surprised together.  She’d dithered about food — cook for them herself? call caterers? — and decided to present them with a sheaf of delivery menus and invite them to take their pick.  Then again, if she’d decided to cook, at least she would have had something to do all day — but she had no confidence in her ability to make a meal for a dozen people  _ and _ have it taste good and look nice and be ready at the right time.  

She tried to distract herself by going for a walk in the park.  It was a fine, sunny day, spring teasing at summer, and the place was full of families with children and pets.  She saw someone walking a tabby cat with a harness and leash and thought of Sharky, and then felt like a pervert for dragging some innocent random cat into thoughts like that.  At that point her phone pinged in her pocket and turned out to be Sharky texting her a picture of a cat tail butt plug.  She found a quiet spot to sit in the lee of a large rock where she felt somewhat screened from view but not as if she was all alone and an obvious target for lurking opportunist thieves or actual perverts.  

_ Speak of the devil. _

**_wow_ **

_ No I mean I was just thinking of you!  I’m not calling you the devil!  I’m sorry, please don’t be upset. _

**_relax I thought u gave me a promotion, I was honoured.  when we’re playing u wanna call me Your Satanic Majesty or anything?_ **

_ Oh God no. _

**_ur not actually religious r u?  I mean I don’t know.  u don’t seem religious._ **

_ Not remotely.   _

**_Good cuz I’m a heathen.  u wanna call me anything special for the kittycat game?  sometimes helps_** **_w the whole RP thing or puts a line between Doing That and rest of our time_**

Holly thought about it.   _ Promise not to laugh. _

**_promise, u can get weird w me, only humiliation here shd be *~consensual~*_ **

_ May I call you Mistress? _

**_okay I just got very turned on here_ **

**_can I just say bonus points for the “may I” u good girl_ **

**_Mistress is very pleased w u_ **

**_how’s that_ **

Holly cradled her phone in her hands, knowing she was blushing, feeling a hot glow low in her tummy and a bloom of wetness in her pussy, deeply, foolishly happy.  She was embarrassed to carry on in this vein but it felt like she was being invited to, like it was welcome.

_ Thank you Mistress. _

**_Ooh I feel so classy.  what shd I call my kittycat? still Holly, or Kitty or Pussy or?_ **

_ I would love you to call me Pussy. _

**_Good Pussy._ **

_ I’m in public and my face is so red and I’m so happy. _

**_lol where_ **

_ Central Park _

**_oh okay so u prob got some space around you?  no 1 reading over ur shoulder?_ **

_ Right. _

**_I like being able to make you go all red remotely.  powerful!  SO ANYWAY I’m lookin forward to petting my Pussy_ **

_ Please don’t tell the others about that yet. _

**_No prob.  about any of it or about being Mistress and Pussy?_ **

_ The details of it.  Like the names Mistress and Pussy and what specifically we’re going to do.  You can say we’re doing a what did you call it, DS thing? _

**_D/s, big D for me, little s for u_ **

_ Okay, a D/s thing but maybe say I’m shy about the details and would like them to be private for now. _

**_Phew bc I did already mention that much to the girls, said we were still working out the deetz_ **

**_maybe later on and this is only if u decide u want to once u have time to get comf w it_ **

**_maybe later on we could give them a little show and u can show off ur training/how obedient u can be_ **

_ OMG _

**_shit I made u OMG, that bad or good?_ **

_ Unbelievably hot as a fantasy really scary as a prospective reality? _

**_gotcha_ **

**_keep it for fantasy for now neway_ **

_ Like you’d bring me out on a leash and show what you could put inside me? _

**_on a leash fuck yeah and I like to think of it as what **U** can fit inside u, like this is ur achievement, I trained my Pussy but we trained ur pussy together_ **

**_like srsly I’ll be so proud of u my little Holly Pussy cramming her pussy_ **

_ I might not be able to take that much at first. _

**_that’s why it’s training_ **

**_first time out we can find out where ur at now, then figure out where to go_ **

**_hell if u want a little Pussy Training Progress sticker book or some shit I WILL MAKE IT FOR U_ **

**_merit certificates_ **

**_and of course kitty treats_ **

**_I got a friend does this and she uses goldfish crackers for her kitties I thought that was rly cute_ **

_ I know you’re teasing but I would actually really like the certificates. _

**_U GOT IT_ **

**_so we got rewards: kitty treats, certificates, ORGASMS never 4get, praises and strokes and pets_ **

**_what’s good for punishment?_ **

_ Teasing me and not letting me come till I beg. _

**_oooooohhh that’s super mean I love it._ **

_ Spanking but please only with your hand because I’m too scared of paddles and things. _

**_got it.  no paddles for my Pussy only Mistress’ hand_ **

Holly shivered and told herself no one could see what she was thinking.  

**_how r u w verbal humiliation stuff?  I’m a talker_ **

**_but u know that_ **

_ I like you teasing me about how I can’t control myself. _  She took a deep breath and sent the next part quickly.   _ Could you call me a cat in heat? _

**_yes Pussy I could_ **

_ <3<3<3 _

**_how r u feeling?_ **

_ Wet and trembly.  Good. _

**_primed for tonight :D_ **

_ I can’t wait but I’m also so nervous.  I want it to be tonight already! _

**_u don’t need to be nervous u know we’re already crazy bout u.  Skinny wants to fuck ur showerhead again._ **

_ What do you want to do? _

**_blaze up, eat pussy, dance, drink, party hard_ **

_ You’re so good at enjoying yourself. _

**_so r u once u let go <3_ **

 

When she got in from her walk she told the officious new doorman that she was expecting guests tonight.  

“Yes, ma’am, how many?”

“A dozen.  But one will be arriving later than the others.  Actually, they may arrive a few at a time, I’m not sure about that.  Anyway, I’m expecting them from around seven-thirty.”

“And they are, uh, young ladies like the other two?”

Holly paused, trying to contain her annoyed reaction, her hands on the cool marble counter, a sort of little wall around the doorman’s desk.   _ How old  _ are _ you?  Twenty-five?  And you’re asking me about “young ladies” like you’re Jeeves or something?  Prissy little shit. _  “That’s right!” she said brightly.  “My friends from Tuesday and Wednesday night included.  Aren’t they delightful?”

He gave a polite, insincere smile.  “I’ll send them right up, ma’am.”

At least he was as good as his word.  She was just checking the fridge again where, no, none of the bottles had disappeared since the last time she looked when there was a thump on the door and a voice said “Open up, it’s the police, we received a report of a sinful ass in this apartment.”  There was a lot of muffled scuffling and giggling as she hurried to let them in.  Four of them came tumbling through the door, Jay scrambling to be in front.  

“Oh wow!  You’re so  _ fancy _ I gotta pick you up like a  _ princess _ this time,” she exclaimed, and swept Holly literally off her feet to twirl her around.

“That outfit is amazing,” Kay said, leaning in to kiss her cheek.  “That peignoir!  That negligée!  All that French shit!”

“Thank you,” said Holly, clinging a bit to Jay’s neck and giggling.  “I was trying for a sort of 30s/40s Hollywood glamour thing.”

“And your hair, girl!” Chip exclaimed.  “You look like Veronica Lake.”

“That is  _ exactly _ who I was copying.  And I thought  _ you _ weren’t coming till late!”  She leaned out to kiss Chip too, wondering how long Jay could sustain this lift.

“There’s some kind of electrical failure in the building where the studio is,” Chip said, shrugging, “so nothing works and it’s pitch black inside.  We waited around to see if it’d get fixed but after a while we’d called all the peeps with appointments to reschedule and Rumi said ‘Just go on, git’ like a cowboy, so here I am!”

“Well, that’s wonderful.”  It changed her plans for the better; they could open presents as soon as everyone was here.  

“Oookay, gotta putcha down,” said Jay with a little grunt, swinging Holly’s satin-muled feet back to the floor.  “Man, the moving company pays good but I am  _ beat,” _ she added, pressing her hands into the small of her back and arching it.

“Oh no,” said Holly, dismayed at seeing her plans falling away already.  “You’re not too tired to have fun tonight, are you?”

“Fuck no, my second wind is legendary.  I just need a bite to eat.  Took a shower, freshened up, wearing a certain someone’s silky undies, ready to roll.”  She slung her arms around Holly’s shoulders and pulled her in for a soft, deep kiss, sliding her hands gradually down her back to cup her bottom.  “There’s nothing under this nightie but garters and stockings, is there?” she murmured against Holly’s cheek.

“And me,” Holly said.  “A lot of me.”

“My favourite part.”

“Hey young lovers,” said Ella, tapping Holly’s shoulder.  “Didn’t get my kiss yet.”

“Oh God, I’m sorry,” said Holly, turning to kiss her quickly and making it a little wetter than she would have to compensate for the wait.  She noticed as she pulled back that Ella was wearing her favourite bootleg  _ Hamilton _ teeshirt, the one with the pastel-coloured silhouettes of the Schuyler sisters under the word WORK, and tried to suppress a silly grin at the thought of how surprised she was going to be.

She failed, and Ella grinned back.  “What’s got you so giggly?”

“It’s just — it’s this fizzy, ticklish feeling of ‘Oh look!  My girlfriends are here!  They’re all so lovely!’  Do you want a drink?  Let me get you a drink, and oh, Jay, your bite to eat!  I can  _ feed _ you this time.”  She grabbed their hands and towed them to the kitchen.

She had just made sure everyone had a drink, and was hand-feeding Jay strawberries that she had meant for tomorrow’s breakfast but it didn’t matter because Jay loved them, when there was a further knock and Kay let Skinny and Carnie in.

“We come bearing weed,” Carnie announced as the door closed behind them.  “Good bud this time.  Holy shit, Holly, you look bangin’.”  She rushed into the kitchen, bounced up to sit on the countertop and leaned over to smack a kiss on Holly’s cheek.  “Shorty stealth moves,” she said with a smirk.

“You put your ass on that clean counter?” Jay asked.

“You put  _ Holly’s _ ass on that counter.  It is known.”  Carnie stole a strawberry.

“That’s okay ‘cuz it’s her counter.  Also Holly’s ass is made of rosepetals and marshmallow,” Jay said, fluttering her eyelashes at Holly.

“Oh, you  _ suck-up,” _ said Skinny.  “Holls, I’d kiss you but I'm kinda gross and grimy from the day I had.”

“What the fuck’ve you been doing?” Ella asked, wrinkling her nose.  The smell had just reached Holly too and she felt relieved she wasn't the only one with that reaction.  

“Cleaning out the kitchen of a diner got shut down for health violations.  It is fuckin’  _ nasty _ in there.  Gordon Ramsay would get the vapours.  Can I use your shower, Miss Holly?”  Skinny put her palms together with her elbows sticking out in a sort of begging gesture.

“How do you  _ find _ jobs like that?  Like I know you're a good cleaner but why is it always the nightmare shit?” Ella persisted. 

“Word of mouth!  People remember me from other hella gross jobs.  Hey, that guy Ted I told you about, he might hire me when his boy goes to college and  _ he _ does crime scene clean-up.  Like after the cops have got their evidence and gone.”

“Oh my God.”

“It's steady work!  And  _ he _ knows a woman who decontaminates ex-meth labs.”

“I think you should shower as soon as possible before we all come down with something,” Holly said hastily.  

“I mean, I was in coveralls and gloves and shit and I washed my hands up to the elbow but the smell gets into your hair and skin,” Skinny said apologetically, following her to the bathroom.  “Rancid grease, man.  I don't even notice it as much till I see people smelling  _ me.” _

“You don’t have to think about rancid grease or Gordon Ramsay or  _ anything _ squalid or unpleasant,” Holly said.  “Tonight is  _ all _ about comfort and pleasure and indulgence.  I want to spoil you!”  She turned to face Skinny, taking her hands.  “So take just as long of a shower as you want, and when you’re clean and comfortable and fresh, there’ll be pyjamas for you on the bed, there’ll be a drink for you — what would you like?  Do you want a champagne cocktail?  I make such a good one, a strawberry in the glass, covered with peach schnapps and then the champagne on top.  I’ll have to hurry or Jay will wolf all the strawberries.”   _ I’m going on and on and oh God Holly stop you’re trying too hard you sound like an idiot an overly eager idiot. _

“That sounds delish,” said Skinny, beaming.  “I’ll scrub up good.”

“Oh, and there’s no hurry.  Play with the showerhead as much as you like.”  She blew Skinny a kiss and hurried back to the kitchen to confiscate the rest of the strawberries from Jay, then to the door to greet the rest of the girls, arriving in a clamour of greetings and laughter.  Sharky threw her over her shoulder and paraded her around the living room till she begged to be set down, breathless with giggles and dizzy and red-faced from her head hanging down.  

“You’re terrible,” Holly protested, slapping Sharky’s chest even as she stumbled forward and needed Sharky to catch her.  

“Yeah, I am,” Sharky agreed cheerfully, pulling her into a bear hug.  She breathed in deeply against Holly’s cheek and whispered, “Hi, Pussy.”

“Shh-shh-shh.”  Holly flung her arms around Sharky’s shoulders and kissed her, opening her mouth softly and feeling her heart go bump as Sharky’s tongue brushed hers.   Now she wanted to scrap all other plans for the evening and be carried to bed and ravished repeatedly.

“Oh no, the bed,” she said, pulling back.

“What about it?”

“I forgot about Skinny.”

“You left her in bed?  Hey, come back here, I’m not done groping you.”  Sharky grabbed Holly’s hips as she twisted away and followed her into her bedroom as if she was trying to get a conga line going.

“No, I meant to get out some pyjamas for her, she’s taking a shower.”  Holly could hear the shower running and Skinny singing unintelligibly but happily.  She shook off Sharky’s hands and bent to open a drawer.  She had done some rationalising of her other clothes and cleared one large drawer for the girls; it was easy to pick out the pyjamas she’d chosen to give Skinny by their pattern of goldfish and lilypads.  “Do you think she’ll like these?  I thought they’d suit her.”

“You bought her PJs?  And here I had to wear your old teeshirt.”

“One, you did not have to wear my old teeshirt, you scavenged it.  Two, she’s lost in my clothes so naturally I wanted her to have something in her own size.  Three, this pair is yours.”  She slapped the folded violet silk pair into Sharky’s hands and went to lay the cotton goldfish out nicely on the bed.  

“Wow, these are  _ luxe,” _ said Sharky, shaking them out and gazing at them appreciatively.  “But… can I still scavenge your teeshirt too?  Thought I looked sort of cute in it.”

“If you’d  _ rather _ wear a twenty-year old shirt that’s all pilled under the arms, by all means be my guest.”

“Don’t be huffy, Holly-baby,” Sharky said coaxingly, dumping herself down on the bed and pulling Holly into her lap.  “I wanted to wear it ‘cuz it’s  _ yours _ and I’m a sentimental fucker sometimes.  Yeah?”  She bounced Holly gently and kissed her neck.  

“I wouldn’t play favourites and only give Skinny something pretty.  I have nice things for  _ all _ of you.  And if you want that scruffy old shirt to be your special thing to wear when you stay with me, well, I should take it as a compliment, I suppose.”  She leaned her head against Sharky’s.  “Don’t know why I was so touchy about it.  I just — I just want tonight to be nice and to feel special.”

“Oh come on.  Look at this place, look at you.  The titties alone!  This is clearly a special occasion.”  Sharky grinned at her and squeezed her thigh.  “And now we’re all here and we can have a great time.  You’re getting fucked so hard tonight.”

“I should be used to you saying things like that by now.”

“But you’re not,” Sharky said, her grin broadening.  “You’re blushing.  We’re gonna fuck you, Holly.  You’re gonna come till you scream.  Wanna see if I can make you squirt right now?”

“Oh gosh.  Not yet?  But only not yet.  Definitely later.  Please.”  Holly kissed her eagerly, pressing close against her body, feeling ripples of tingly warmth.  She only half-noticed the shower noise stopping, and jumped when she felt Skinny lean past her to pick up the pyjamas.

“These’re what you meant, right?” Skinny asked.  She was wrapped in a towel, her usually spiky hair slicked down against her head.  “Oh shit, did you get these special for me?  Thanks, Holly!”

“Hey, you smell good,” said Sharky, sniffing.  “Like an orange creamsicle.”

“Holly’s shower gel is awesome.  I came in here stinking like a diner grease trap.  ‘Cuz today I cleaned out a diner grease trap.  But now I smell  _ lickable.” _

“There’s a matching lotion in the bathroom cabinet,” Holly told her.

“Put it on and maybe she’ll lick you,” said Sharky, swatting Skinny’s narrow bottom through the towel.

“She was gonna lick me anyway,” said Skinny, sashaying back to the bathroom.

“That’s probably true.”  Holly slipped from Sharky’s lap.  “Come on, I want to make her the drink I promised her too.”

“Damn, Skinny’s getting the VIP service tonight.”

“You get a drink  _ and _ I’ll sit in your lap again.”

She was sitting in Sharky’s lap in the living room and stealing sips from her glass when Skinny emerged, fragrant and pyjama-clad; the others met her with cheers and whistles and calls for a catwalk.

“Oh!” cried Holly, sitting up straight.  “Now everyone is here and ready, I need you all to go into the bedroom and shut the door and wait while I set up the surprise!”

“There’s a surprise?”

“Woo!”

“Are we gonna come out and you’re just gonna be naked and greased up?”

“It’s the baskets of Persian kittens, I’m telling you.  Did you just hear a mew?”

“Porque no los dos?”

“Go on, go on,” said Holly, getting up and shooing them towards her room.  They went with some good-natured grumbling.  

“We’re just gonna try on all your clothes.”

“I’m gonna bounce on your bed.”

“I’m gonna make sweet love to your entire dildo collection.”

“Think you’ll have time?  It’s a  _ lot.” _

“Now stay in there and don’t peek,” Holly insisted, trying to get the door shut behind them against Chip’s laughing interference.  “Let me surprise you!”

She rushed around bringing the presents out of the study and arranging them on and around the coffee table, both bursting to see how the girls would like them and fighting down a fear that she’d overdone things.  With everything set out she took a deep breath, and then drained the nearest glass of champagne before calling out, “Come out now!”

Jay popped her head out of the bedroom door.  “Too late!  Everyone went bye-byes.  All curled up sleeping in a puppy pile.”

“I don’t believe you, and also, ta-daa!”  Holly struck a Vanna White sort of pose, gesturing at the presents.

“Oh, damn!  What’s all that?”

“What’s all what?” Carnie asked, crawling out between Jay’s legs.  She stopped and stared, her eyes wide.  “Is that  _ Christmas?” _

“It’s everyone’s unbirthday,” said Holly, “like  _ Alice in Wonderland.   _ Come out and see!”  As they emerged and took in the pile of brightly wrapped boxes and parcels, they all looked so stunned she grew anxious and began to talk too fast.  “You see, I just — well, I wanted to give you all a treat.  You don’t get enough treats, and you work so hard, and you deserve something special, and I wanted — here.  This one’s for you.”  The box with Chip’s new phone in it was nearest at hand and she grabbed it and held it out to her.

“Thank you,” said Chip.  “Wow, this paper is beautiful.  Camellias.”

“Please open it!  I just need to see if you like it,” Holly said, trying her best not to hop on the spot.  “The suspense is killing me.”

“Okay, okay, don’t blow a valve,” Chip laughed.  She sat down, deftly slit the tape with the edge of her thumbnail and unwrapped the box in her lap.  “Oh my gosh!  Seriously?”

“Yes.  Is it right?  I mean, I think I can exchange it if you’d rather have another colour.”

“No!  I mean it’s perfect!”  Chip’s cheeks had gone a dark russet red and her eyes looked bright and wet.  “This is so great, how did you  _ know? _  My phone died  _ today _ and I was trying not to think about it!  I didn’t want to spoil tonight being upset!”

“I had no idea!  I just knew the screen was cracked.  Oh, how lucky!”  Holly threw herself onto the couch next to Chip and hugged her, flushed with relief.  

“I mean I could always get a burner but this is so  _ nice!” _ Chip said, muffled by Holly’s shoulder.  “You’re awesome, Holly.  Thank you.”  She kissed her warmly.  

“Can I open mine?  Are we taking turns or can we all go hog wild?” Kay asked, palpating the parcel with her name on it.

“Yes, please, everyone, go ahead!”  She sat eagerly watching (Chip had let go of her to open up her new phone and squeal over it) as they opened their presents, some tearing off the wrapping impatiently, a few smoothing it out neatly, pelting each other with scrunched tissue paper, giggling and exclaiming in delight.

“Oh, sweet!”

“I’m gonna smell  _ delicious!” _

“OMG, the whole set!   _ In rainbow order!” _

“Holly, these are beautiful!  You have such great taste!”

“Can I ride it in here?  I’m just gonna ride it in here.”

Ella, who had just been admiring Kay’s new satchel, eagerly ripped open her own parcel and couldn’t disguise her surprise and disappointment at seeing a quite ordinary black nylon backpack, nothing that couldn’t be bought pretty cheaply in any sports store.  She quickly put on a polite smile, though.  “Thanks, Holly, this’ll be so useful.”

“Yes,” Holly said brightly, “you should look inside.  It has lots of convenient inner pockets.”

“Neat,” Ella said without great conviction.  She unzipped the pack and peered dutifully within.  Holly, avidly watching, saw her register that there was something extra inside, and she pulled out the golden envelope.  “Is this for me too?”

“It has your name on it, doesn’t it?”  Holly found she actually had to sit on her hands, or at least tuck them under her thighs, to keep from fidgeting.

“Maybe it’s a gift card,” Kay said, not terribly politely but with obviously renewed hope.

Ella lifted the flap of the envelope and slid out the contents.  A moment later she shrieked like a steam whistle, sprang to her feet on the seat of the couch and fell over the back with a crash.

“Whoa, the fuck?”  Sharky looked up from helping Gigi set up her new massage table. 

“We got a casualty.”

“Babe, are you all right?” Kay asked, leaning over the back of the couch to haul Ella back to her feet.  She came scrambling over it and hurtled into Holly’s arms, cackling with glee and showering her face with kisses.  

“You are so bad!”

“I’m sorry, I couldn’t resist,” Holly said, laughing breathlessly.  

“Letting me think you gave me the dud gift!  Oh Holly, you rule!”

“What  _ is _ it?” Jay demanded, punching Ella lightly in the buttcheek.

“Tickets for  _ Hamilton!” _ Ella declared, brandishing them in the air.  “We’re gonna have  _ the best night.” _  She smacked another kiss against Holly’s cheek.  “I’ll definitely put out.”

“Oh!  Oh, well, I thought you’d like to go with Kay,” Holly said, flustered.  “The other part of the date is in her bag.”

“Huh?” Kay dug into the satchel, throwing out the tissue stuffing, and said, “Oh hey!  It  _ is _ a gift card.  On actual card.  Is this a swank restaurant?”

“Close to the theatre,” Holly said, nodding.  “I thought dinner  _ and _ a show was more fitting.”

“Aw,  _ Holly.   _ You sure you don’t mind missing out?”

“Honestly, I think it’s more your thing than mine?  I just want you to have fun.”  Holly hugged her tight, a little ashamed of how panicky she’d felt at the prospect of being seen out on a date like that.

“Well,  _ I _ will have a fuckton of fun with  _ this _ rascal,” Sharky declared, brandishing her new vibrator.  “Hey, who wants to get up on Gigi’s table and get a happy ending?”

“It’s cheating to use machinery,” said Gigi, who was still happily patting and smoothing the cushioned top of the table.

“Oh, ya big purist,” said Chip.  “Is it cheating that I don’t use a bone needle and a mallet to tattoo people?”

“Hey, I respect your methods as a fellow professional, I speak only for my own craft.”

“Ooh!” said Sharky.  “We should have a race!  Tradition versus technology, who can get more girls off inside of an hour?”  She mimed pulling a ripcord on her vibrator and made chainsaw noises with her mouth.

“Quantity over quality?  Pscht.”

“So we’ll ask them to rate us.  Customer satisfaction survey.”

“Challenge accepted.”

“Yeah, this is stupid, let’s do it,” Carnie declared, vaulting up onto the table.

Jay plunked herself down on the couch beside Holly and gave her a squeeze.  “Hey, you gave me my Cinderella shoes, fairy sugar mama.”

“You shall go to the ball,” said Holly.  “Or the club.  Wherever you want.”

“Are you kidding?  I can never wear these outdoors.  They’re way too pretty.  How can I let them touch sidewalk?”  Jay held up her feet and turned them from side to side, admiring the sparkling crystals.  “I’ll wear ‘em here with you.  I can wear these and nothing else.”  She kissed Holly softly, brushing her fingers over her breast, making her nipple rise through the silk negligée.

“You look beautiful in them,” Holly sighed.  “And in nothing else.  Oh, I’m  _ so _ glad everyone’s happy with their gifts.  I think tonight’s going to be a good night.”  As she sank into Jay’s arms, as she heard Sharky’s gift buzz into life to a chorus of smutty laughter, it seemed like a sure thing.


	9. Chapter 9

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I've been sitting on this chapter so long I didn't realise I had enough to go ahead with. A lot of it is conversation. I want to mention before it confuses people that Chip plays a more prominent role in this chapter, and while Jay and Sharky's personalities here are very much like their counterparts in Holly Blue Agate is Desperate, Pass It On, this version of Chip is pretty different, with much more confidence. She's still sweet-tempered, but she's not timid and self-deprecating the way Pass It On Chip is. I just found she was turning out differently as I wrote her, so I hope you enjoy this version too.

Music was playing, mellow and deep with an insistent beat, and Jay was kissing her softly, her tongue slipping between her lips, tracing their tingly inner borders, sliding her hand down over Holly’s silk-covered belly to cup and press between her thighs.

“Sweet pretty Holly,” she breathed.  “Lift your skirt up?”

“Mmm…”  Holly arched her back, lifted her bottom and pulled her negligée up over her hips.  Jay’s hands joined hers, stroking and pushing the silk higher, caressing her tummy and her thighs, finding their inner curves hot and damp with sweat before she reached the wet between her pussy lips.  Jay licked her fingers, tasting Holly’s salt, and brought them back to rub gently around her clitoris, working through its hood.

“Good?”

“Hnnn…”  Holly combed her fingers into Jay’s hair, stroking her cheeks, her neck, running them down to push her jacket off her shoulders.  Jay shrugged it off quickly and pulled her tank top off over her head with a flourish, tossing back her hair with a dazzling smile before leaning in to kiss Holly again.  Each kiss was sweet and soft and when they came one after the other they were dizzying.  Holly was beginning to feel wonderfully, warmly, expansively drunk, her lips tingling and her body blooming with heat.  She wanted to tell Jay that she adored her, that she was glorious.  All she managed to do was moan blissfully.  Jay’s fingers were circling, massaging her pussy, drawing the wet down from inside her.

“Talk to me.  Tell me how you feel.”

“Oh… I can’t, I…”

“C’mon, Holly, you’re a  _ chatty _ girl.”  Jay’s face was bright with pleasure and amusement, truly playing with her.  “Tell me all about it.”

“Oh… I’m going to melt.  I’m going to melt all over your hand.  I don’t know.”  Holly was panting, her chest and tummy rising and falling fast and light.  “Will you put your fingers inside me?”

“You know I will, you know I will,” Jay crooned, swirling her fingertips over Holly’s wet inner lips, sliding in her middle finger perhaps an inch, then her ring finger beside it, teasing and stroking the mouth of her cunt.  She reached deeper, her hand undulating smoothly, her palm pressed to Holly’s mound, and all the time held her gaze, her dark eyes warm and bright.  All around them the other girls were talking and laughing, Holly could hear the fierce buzz of Sharky’s new wand and the little panting cries of whoever was getting the benefit of it, but her focus was on Jay’s face and Jay’s hand, gently, intently feeling for her sweet spot.  

“I’m going to be a pest,” Holly breathed.  “I wanted you inside but now I want you on my clit again.  Just here.”

“Yeah?  Like this?”  Her fingers were hot and slick now, confidently working the stiff stem of Holly’s clitoris.  “You’re not a pest, you’re just horny.  It’s  _ good _ to be this horny.  Right?”

“It is with you.  It’s  _ so _ good with you.  Ah!”  She caught her breath, her legs trembling.  “Feeling like this alone  _ sucks,” _ she added, and began to giggle.  

“What’re you doing to make her giggle?” Chip asked, leaning over to give her a squeeze.  “I wanna learn that.”

“Nothing,” said Jay, “she’s doin’ it herself.”  Her fingers worked faster, rapidly twitching against the swelling bud.

“So fuckin’ cute,” Chip murmured, smacking a kiss to the side of Holly’s neck, sliding one hand to massage her breast.  “I love my phone, Holly.  I still had the dead one in my bag so I’ve already swapped over the SIM.  You wanna take a picture with me, babe?”

“Oh, not like  _ this!” _ Holly gasped.  

“Just like this.  C’mon, you look so beautiful.  First photo on the new phone.”

“Oh, no-no-no — aah…”  Holly rocked her hips against Jay’s hand, panting faster, her heart pounding as the sweet tension pulled tighter.

“That’s good, isn’t it?  You want me to keep going here?” Jay asked, beaming, avidly watching her reactions.  

“C-come down just a bit, just a bit, there, rub-rub-rub — oh my!”  Holly gasped, feeling the sensation rise so fast and so strong and sweet that it took her voice away for a moment.  She came with a faint squeak and a tremor and lay revelling in the pleasure rolling through her.  Jay gave her a few last gentle strokes and relaxed beside her, licking her fingers and lazily smiling.  Chip stroked her belly and breasts, humming quietly.  Someone nearby exclaimed “Oh, mother _ fucker!” _ at the peak of her own orgasm and Sharky laughed triumphantly, a kind of husky cackle.

Holly lay snuggled between Jay and Chip, getting her breath back, turning her head from one side to the other to press little kisses against their cheeks.

“I’m thirsty,” said Jay, “who’s thirsty?”  She gave Holly’s thigh a little pat.  “Gonna get a beer.  You want something while I’m up?”

“Don’t you want me to…”

“I know you will,” Jay said with a soft chuckle.  She got up and strolled off to the kitchen.  Chip nuzzled Holly’s cheek and wrapped both arms around her waist.

“Call me a total pervert,” she murmured, “but I love watching you get off.  You have such a great expressive face.  Can I just say I was one of the early advocates for the notion you’d be  _ so _ hot once you relaxed and got into it?”

“Thank you for believing in me,” Holly said, and gave a wobbly little giggle.  “Ooh… what can I do for  _ you?” _

“Hmm… later on I’d like to take a shower together, fool around with the fancy showerhead… then when you’re all clean and warm and pink, pat you dry and draw that morning-glory vine on your thigh.”  Chip slipped her fingertip inside the top of Holly’s stocking and swept it from side to side across her inner thigh.  “That be nice?”

“That would be  _ so _ nice.  If that’s for later on, what do you want to do now?”  Holly stroked Chip’s cheek, appreciating the softness of the fine peachfuzz in front of her ear and at the corner of her jaw.

“To tell you the truth, I’m really hungry.  Haven’t eaten anything since lunch and that was only a hot dog.”

“Poor baby.  I’ll get you a snack and then we can talk to the others about what to order for dinner.”

 

After a little debate, and some good-natured complaining from Sharky who insisted she would have won the orgasm race if it hadn’t been cut short, they decided to order Thai.  While they waited for the delivery, Carnie produced from her backpack, with a flourish, a respectably-sized bag of weed and a glass bong.  Once it was set up she and Skinny found it highly entertaining to try to teach Holly to use it.

“You are such a  _ noob, _ it’s adorable.”

“This is complicated,” Holly said crossly, folding her arms as she sat between them on the floor by the coffee table.  

“It’s not complicated, stoners can do it,” Carnie pointed out, holding her lighter to the bowl and demonstrating with practised ease.

“Yes yes, I know, I’m ridiculous and I’ve never done  _ anything.   _ I must look so stupid to you.”  She  _ felt _ stupid; she’d been looking forward to being au fait with smoking a joint this time around and they had to go and upgrade their technology on her.

“Aw, c’mon,” said Skinny reasonably.  “You’ve done a ton of stuff we’ve never done.  You’ve been overseas, right?  Paris, London, Rome and shit?”

“A few times,” Holly admitted.  “Mostly business trips.”  

“So if you hid me in your suitcase next time you went, and we got there and I was all  _ whoa, _ would you be like  _ what a fuckin’ rube _ or would you be like  _ it’s so fun to see her enjoy all this for the first time, I wanna show her my favourite places?” _

“Is it like that?” Holly asked, surprised.  

“Of course it is,” Sharky said, sitting down on the couch behind them and rubbing Holly’s shoulders.  “Same as getting you to try new stuff in the sack.  I’m just thinking, I feel damn lucky to be the one to give her this experience.  Right?”

“Yup,” said Carnie.  “But keep in mind I fit in a suitcase better than beanpole here.”

“Nuh-uh, I fold up.”

“That feels a little better, then,” Holly said, rolling her shoulders under Sharky’s warm hands.  

“Like I said, I think you keep underestimating the whole hotness factor of seeing you ditch all those inhibitions,” Sharky murmured, stroking the nape of her neck.  “Doing stuff you only fantasised about before.”

“That doesn’t apply so much to this,” Holly pointed out, tapping the side of the bong with one fingernail.  

“Same principle.  So don’t worry about it.”

“So hey,” said Skinny, leaning closer and stroking Holly’s thigh, “tell us some of those fantasies.  What goes on in your dirty little mind?  Maybe we can do some of ‘em tonight.”  

“Oh, um, nothing really.”

“I call bullshit, no way someone who masturbates as much as you do doesn’t have a head full of fantasies.”

“I just… look, honestly?  I don’t fantasise about  _ me _ , things that could happen to  _ me.   _ Because for a long time that was just frustrating and discouraging because I got so sure nothing ever really would happen.  My turn.”  Holly made a renewed effort and successfully got a decent intake of sweetish smoke without drooling into the pipe.  

“Aw,” said Skinny sympathetically.  “So what, then?  Just like… the abstract concept of fucking?”

“No, don’t be silly.”

“C’monnnn.”

“She doesn’t  _ have _ to tell you,” Sharky said, sliding her hand down Holly’s back inside her negligée.  

“What are you doing, by the way?” Holly asked over her shoulder. 

“Feeling you up,” Sharky said with a winning smile. 

“Carry on.”

“Thank you, Miss Holly,” Sharky said, and lightly drew her nails up Holly’s back again, making her shiver pleasantly.  

“C’mon,” Skinny said again, leaning her head on Holly’s shoulder and giving her a beseeching look.  

“Oh, for — fictional characters, okay?”

“Cool, cool, cool.  Me too sometimes.  Like who?”  

Holly glanced away.  “If I don’t tell you you’ll imagine something weird, right?”

“The weirdest.  Flo from the Progressive ads.”

“Flo is pretty,” Carnie objected.  

“Sorry, didn’t mean to diss your girlfriend,” Skinny said with a lazy grin.  “She is a totally acceptable insurance mascot to want to fuck.”

“Wanting to fuck the Geico gecko, now  _ that _ would be weird.”

“You know there’s someone on the internet drawing seductive gecko porn though.  On commission.”

“To stop you talking about sexy geckos,” Holly said quickly, “Joan from  _ Mad Men.” _

They exchanged a high-five in front of her.  “Nice,” said Carnie.  “Buxom as fuck.”

“But I mean obviously in the  _ show _ her love life is full of drama and misery and  _ men, _ so I gave her a different one that I would enjoy more.”

“I never really watched it,” said Skinny, “I just like know it from gif sets.  She bang Elisabeth Moss in your version?”

“Sometimes,” Holly said airily.  “She gets around.”  She was feeling hot and flushed and anxious and fluttery and trying not to show it; they didn’t seem to think it was as ridiculous as it felt, but she would still rather have changed the subject, if only she could think of something to change it to.

“Just like you, then,” Sharky said.

“Just like who?” Kay asked, plunking herself down on the other side of the table and holding out her hand in a beckoning gesture towards the bong.  She made a feeble little beseeching noise like  “Ih.  Ih.”

“Here you go, No-Face,” said Skinny, sliding it over to her.  Kay blew her a kiss.  

“Holly wants to fuck Christina Hendricks,” said Carnie.

“Our lady of perpetual titties,” said Kay, and crossed herself.  

“Or  _ be _ Christina Hendricks and fuck everyone else, I was hazy on the details.”

“That’s not what I was saying at all!” Holly protested.  “I  _ said, _ after being  _ pumped _ for information, that I had a — a running, recurring sexual fantasy starring Joan Holloway, her  _ character _ from  _ Mad Men. _  I wouldn’t know what to say to Christina Hendricks.  I’d probably be too embarrassed to talk to her after the ways I’ve imagined her.”

“Well, you just have good taste,” said Kay, “because she is like absurdly hot.”

“Who’s absurdly hot?” Chip asked, joining them with orange soda in hand.  

“Christina Hendricks.”

“Okay, but I hated that whole — you know how every once in a while the media decides an actress who’s like  _ vaguely _ curvy is fuckable and there’s a rash of think pieces about how beauty standards are changing, and then everything goes on exactly like before and we’re all still supposed to devote like 80% of our lives to trying to be thin?  Fuck that.”  Chip rolled her eyes and snorted.  “So it’s totally not Christina Hendricks’ fault but when I think of her I always think of how that pissed me off.”

“I always think of a) her magnificent bosoms and 2) that whole revival of 50s-60s fashion, like I got  _ so _ many commissions to make wiggle dresses and tailor vintage stuff, that was  _ sweet.”   _ Kay took a long look at Holly, as if sizing her up.  “You would look fantastic in that kinda style.”

“Well, that was a few years ago, the revival’s over.  I couldn’t have pulled it off even when it was in.”  Holly tried to wave the idea away.  

“Yeah you could.  Why not?”

“I’d — I’d have looked like a parody of myself.  I mean, I actually do work on Madison Avenue.  It would be kind of on the nose.”

“Pscht.  You would still look really hot.  You don’t have to wear it to work.”  Kay leaned across the table on her elbows, her eyes sparking.  “Can I dress you up?”

“She your new dolly?” asked Sharky.

“Pleeeeease?  You need some fun clothes, you know you do.  I’ll help you pick things out, I know all kinds of great vintage stores, I can cut practically anything to fit you just right.  If we can’t find it in your size, hell, I’ll take a good look at it and  _ make _ one in your size, I do that all the time.  And I’m cheap.  It would be soooo much fun.”  She bounced her bottom on the floor for emphasis.  

“I — I’ll think about it.  We could go shopping,” Holly said, steamrollered.  

“Woo!  You’re gonna love it.   _ I _ love it.  Like crafting a wardrobe for someone, a complete look?  Gives me life.”

“Trust her,” said Sharky, snaking one arm over Holly’s shoulder to help herself to the bong, “she’s the fashionista.”

“She really is,” said Skinny.  “When are we gonna see your name in  _ Vogue,  _ Kay?”

_ “One _ day,” said Kay.  “Dunno if I’ll be designing the clothes or the layouts, but I’ll be in there, probably right opposite an ad Holly worked on.”  She peered at Holly again.  “You know, if you didn’t wanna go the whole Joan Hollo-way, we could do a Miranda Priestly thing.”

“Miranda —  _ oh,  _ from  _ The Devil Wears Prada?” _

“You so remind me of her,” Kay said.  “Not like you’re the devil!  Just that whole  _ look _ .”

“I  _ wish _ I looked as good as Meryl Streep, and she’s old enough to be my mother,” Holly said with feeling.  

“That kind of icy hotness,” Kay said dreamily.  

“You have to forgive her,” said Chip.  “I went to that thing  _ three times  _ with her.  She was in love.”

“Anne Hathaway was an idiot!” Kay exclaimed.  “I’d give my left tit for a shot like that, and all she could do was whine.  So she’s a scary boss  _ and _ you don’t give a shit about fashion,  _ why _ are you taking up this job that someone who would live for it could be doing?”

“Shh, shh,” said Chip, stroking her back.  “‘Cuz the fish out of water genre requires it.”

“Stupid jerkass ungrateful fish,” Kay said, but subsided and took a pull of her beer.  

“Was that our first stoned slash drunk rant of the night?” Sharky asked.  “Looks like a contender.”

“Oh please, I’m barely buzzed.”  She turned back to Holly.  “See, the thing is, all your clothes are  _ good.   _ Great labels, great quality, great lines, but they’re all like the most safe and conservative things you could find.  They’re so not  _ you. _  I mean I totally get you need to look elegant, professional, dignified, all of that.  I just think we can do that and show your real personality a little more.”

“I’m — I’m not really  _ out _ at work.  I don’t lie about it but I don’t  _ talk _ about it.”  Holly twined her fingers together doubtfully.  “So I mean…”

“Okay, got it, no purple jacket with ‘I’m A Huge Lesbian’ Bedazzled on the back,” Kay said with a wry smile.

“I think it’s classier across the butt, like Juicy sweatpants,” said Skinny.

“No, I — I trust your judgement,” Holly protested, “I just want you to understand why I might say yes to some things for my  _ fun _ clothes but not for work.”

“Oh, sweet, so your fun clothes can be  _ super _ gay.  I’m all over it.”  Kay winked at her and kissed the air.  

“You gotta get her a hot outfit to go clubbing in,” Sharky said, wrapping her arms round Holly’s shoulders from behind and squeezing her.  “I wanna show you off, Holly.  Glamorous dressed-up Holly-dolly.”  She kissed the top of Holly’s head as the intercom chimed.

“Food’s here!”

“Hide the weed!”

“But if it’s a cute girl invite her in.”

 

Holly’s room was dark when she opened her eyes; someone must have turned the light off before passing out, although there was still music playing quietly somewhere.  What was the name of that song?  It was the one that went with the mannequin challenge, which she remembered the girls showing her on their phones a while ago.  “Black Beatles.”   _ Good Holly, clever Holly, you learned a meme.   _ Her head was very muddled but above all else she needed to pee.  Getting up in the middle of the night, peeing and drinking some water before going back to sleep probably counted as the sensible, responsible thing to do, didn’t it?  She was still drunk and not yet hungover so she wasn’t quite sure.  She was so warm and comfy where she was, spooning Sharky, but it was getting bad.  What time was it?  She hadn’t put her phone on its dock.  She rolled over and clambered over Gigi and staggered to the bathroom, almost stepping on someone on the floor, the minor alarm of which led to almost peeing on the person on the floor, so that she made it the rest of the way to the toilet at a tiptoe run.

Sitting on the toilet she had that strange feeling that the room was moving gently.  She wondered if there was any bottled water left in the fridge; she wanted something really icy cold.  Also in the kitchen there was a clock on the microwave door.  The time probably wasn’t important, it was Sunday tomorrow, no, it was obviously Sunday already but now she wanted to know, if only for the satisfaction of sinking back into bed thinking, “It doesn’t matter that I’m awake at 3.30 am (or whatever) because I can sleep as long as my drunken promiscuous heart desires.”

She felt strange wandering around naked in the dark, at least when she was alone and no one was egging her on, so she pulled her bathrobe from the back of the door and wrapped herself up as she padded to the kitchen.  The beer and wine supply had been pillaged but the Fiji water bottles had barely been touched, and oh, they were lovely and cold.   She stood in the light of the open fridge door swigging down half a bottle before looking around.  There were still a few people awake out here with the lights dimmed right down; Beez and Bunny were making love on one couch while Skinny and Carnie were cuddled under a blanket together on the other, Carnie sitting between Skinny’s legs and leaning back against her chest, playing on the new 3DS while Skinny watched sleepily over her shoulder.  

A cool breeze touched Holly’s bare legs and she realised the sliding door onto the balcony was open a crack; someone was sitting out there on the cane divan.  In the name of being a good hostess, she took her water bottle, scooped up a blanket from the end of the couch (her bedding plans had ended up haphazardly strewn around), and went to see if whoever was warm enough.  Skinny looked up as she passed and blew her a kiss.

The person on the balcony was Chip; Holly saw the end of a joint glow orange as she stepped out, illuminating her face as she inhaled.  “Oh hey, Holly,” she said.  “I thought you tapped out a while ago.”

“I had a nap,” Holly said, sitting down beside her and tucking one foot up under herself.  “Do you want a blanket?  It’s chilly out here.”

“Thanks.”  Chip hitched herself closer to her and they arranged the blanket over their laps.  “You have an amazing view.”  

Holly looked out at the cityscape, the dark towers pricked all over with light, the sharp grid of streets and avenues far below.  “I should look at it more,” she admitted.  “I’ve taken it for granted.  Seeing things with you girls opens my eyes again.”

“The view from my apartment is a fire escape, so yeah.  But on the other hand there’s a cute grey cat that likes to hang out on it and show her tummy.  You don’t have a cat to look at.”  She offered Holly the joint.  

“True,” said Holly, accepting it and inhaling with much more assurance.  “You can’t have everything, I guess.”  That made Chip giggle and rest her head on Holly’s shoulder, so she counted it as a big success.  

“I love my phone and I love that you noticed I needed it,” said Chip.  “You ready to take that selfie together now?”  She lifted it in readiness.  

“Oh God no,” said Holly.  “You look fine but my hair is all over the place and all my make-up came off  fooling around in the shower.”

“I won’t post it anywhere, I just want to  _ have _ it.  You know, a memento.  Fuck anyone who doesn’t like how you look.  And fuck all that ‘everyone is beautiful’ waffle too.  It doesn’t matter.  What  _ you _ like about yourself is what matters.”

Holly blinked at her, startled.  She wasn’t sure if Chip was saying she  _ wasn’t  _ beautiful or what.  Did she honestly not think it mattered?

“Sorry,” Chip said, “I get a little intense about that stuff.  You heard some of it earlier.”

“But  _ you’re  _ so beautiful,” Holly faltered.  “Not just how you look naturally but how you’ve made yourself look, all your tattoos.  I thought you cared a  _ lot _ about beauty.”

“I do, but…” Chip sucked at the joint, frowning in thought.  “Okay.  So I do think beauty is important, like beauty in nature, beauty in art, but I also think beauty  _ standards  _ are really fucked up.  They want women like you and me to always be thinking really hard about how we look but never be happy with it.  I mean, me?  I’m big, brown and kinda butch.  It’s a little different for you because you’re white and femme as fuck, but you’re not supposed to feel good either because you’re fat.”

Holly blinked hard and busied her hands with the joint rather than show how much  _ that _ remark stung.  

“And the answer to this is not all ‘everyone is beautiful, oowoo,’ ‘cuz that’s like trying to solve inequality by declaring everyone’s rich!  The answer for  _ me,  _ anyway, is fuck all of that, I only go by what  _ I  _ like about me and my body and what people I  _ trust  _ and  _ respect  _ like about me and my body, and don’t fuck with anyone else.  So — so like, all these tattoos?  This is me making what I think is beautiful part of me.  This is mine.”  Chip seemed to run out of steam at that point, and added, “Was that a rant?  Did I go on a stoned rant?  I do that and I don’t know I’m doing it till I’ve done it.”

“It was a little bit ranty, but I saw your point.  I  _ liked  _ your point.  I thought at first you were saying — well, I’m not sure, I was confused, but now I think you’re saying something like, the rules of the game everyone’s supposed to play are rigged so I’m going to play my own game with rules I make up and ignore the rest.”  Holly glanced sideways at Chip.  “Or did I get it wrong?”

“Yeah… kinda.  Not kinda wrong, that’s kind of what I meant.  I mean either way, I don’t wanna wear make-up or dresses or go on diets ‘cuz that’s all bullshit.  I wanna be covered in flowers.  That’s the takeaway here.  Flowers.  Also berries.  And snakes.  And bugs and lizards.  Like my body’s a garden!  A park!”

“That  _ is  _ beautiful.  So are you gardening on me when you draw things like this?”  Holly found Chip’s hand under the blanket and drew it onto her thigh where Chip had drawn a swirling morning glory vine with markers borrowed from Nina.

“Yeah, guess I am.”  Chip’s hand curved round her inner thigh and stayed there.  

“So I can be beautiful?”

“Shit no.  No, you’re beautiful already.  I knew I wasn’t explaining it right.”

“You did say I was fat.”

“Oh come on, Holly, you think I’d mean that?  Does that sound like me?”

“No,” Holly admitted.  “I told you I was confused.  You also said dresses and make-up and diets are bullshit.”

“They’re bullshit when you do them because you feel like you have to but you don’t want to.  And they’re bullshit when you try to dress them up as ‘oh this is empowering’ and ignore how fuckin’  _ compulsory  _ they are.  But they’re not bullshit if you just honestly like ‘em for what they are.  Sorry, I discoursed all over you.  I sound like fuckin’ Tumblr.”

“Oh.  All right then, diets are bullshit.  Dresses are not.  Necessarily.  Some of them.  Make-up is probably at least partly bullshit but I still don’t feel comfortable being in a photo without any.  Am  _ I  _ making sense?” Holly asked, still feeling she was missing her connection.

“Fucked if I know,” Chip said with a big happy smile that showed her chipped tooth.  “It’s not that deep.  It’s  _ probably _ not that deep.”  She kissed Holly’s cheek, nuzzling against the corner of her jaw.  

“Are your tattoos deep?  Do they each mean something specific, with a story behind it?”

“Hmm…”  Chip leaned back, stroking Holly’s hair off her cheek.  “Well, the first one meant, I am getting my first tattoo and I really wanna do this but I’m also  _ real _ nervous about it so I wanna get something small and cute that doesn’t feel like a huge commitment and I like raspberries.  I was just sixteen.”

“It looks so bright and fresh, though.”  Holly brushed Chip’s shoulder with her fingertips.  She was wearing the pyjamas she’d chosen for her, soft crimson silk with blackwork embroidery.

“I got it retouched a little while ago.  Obviously the hesitation didn’t last long.  I used to get ideas from, okay, my mom would have me go to a neighbour lady after school until she got home from work ‘cuz she didn’t want me setting the place on fire on my own, and her apartment was  _ sooo _ boring to a kid but she had these  _ stacks _ of books about gardens and botany that I’d look through, and I’d trace the pictures.  She didn’t have a  _ garden. _  She had window boxes and like, you know most people, if they’ve got a hydroponics set-up in their apartment they’re growing weed?  She was growing herbs.  Literal herbs.  Mint and stuff.  It always smelled  _ so _ good.  I learned all my favourite flowers from her books.  Here, I’m cold, let’s get this round our shoulders.”  Chip pulled the blanket up around them.  

“Wait — oh shit.”  Holly fumbled the smouldering end of the joint, trying not to catch it in the blanket, and dropped it; it bounced away and under the glass fence of the balcony, spinning off into the night like a dying firefly.  “Oh nooooo.  I’m sorry.” 

“Ah, there wasn’t much left.”  Chip snuggled closer to her, pulling her bare feet up on the seat.  “Don’t beat yourself up.  A pigeon will find it and have a great night.”

“I wondered if they were like… the language of flowers, like different colours of roses?”

“Nah, just what I thought looked good in different places.  There’s one that’s different, though, you see this one inside my wrist?  That’s a teuila.  That’s the national flower of Samoa.  So that stands for the side of my family I don’t really know ‘cuz my dad was a good guy but not good with paperwork and also Immigration are assholes so he got deported.”

“Oh.  I’m sorry.”  Holly peered at Chip’s wrist but couldn’t make out much by night.

“But I will.  Get to know them, I mean.  I’m saving up and one day I’m going over to meet them.  I mean, I hope we  _ like _ each other, we’ve written each other and talked on the phone and online but it’s not the same, is it?  So I’m saving my money, and I’m saving space for a  _ malu.” _

“Is that another Samoan flower?”   _ Should I buy her a ticket?  No, no, she wants to do this for herself.  Well, I’ll see.  Maybe there’ll be a way I can help without taking it away from her.  Get her an upgrade or something. _

“It’s the traditional tattoo for women.  You get it on the backs of your thighs and down to just below your knees.  I’d never got anything there just ‘cuz I thought it’d be uncomfortable to sit on while it healed, and then I learned more about it and I thought… well, that’s not  _ fate _ but it’s nice it worked out so I’d have the space all ready.  I hope it’s okay to get it,” Chip said, a little wistfully.  “I mean, I hope they say I  _ can. _  I’d have to respect what they say.  Like it’s my culture but it’s  _ their _ culture more, they live in it… I dunno.”

“I would hope they’d want to welcome you home,” Holly said.  “It wasn’t your fault you didn’t grow up in Samoa.”

“No, but I haven’t exactly paid my dues.  There’s a whole way of life,  _ fa’a Samoa _ … eh, why worry about it now?”  Chip snorted and shook her head, shaking the idea off.

“Way of life, whatever, they should absolutely say, ‘We are lucky to have such a delightful young woman in our family.’  They should.  If they don’t they’re fools.   _ Fools, _ Chippy,” Holly said, and poked her in the arm for emphasis.

“You’re so  _ intense _ when you’re drunk,” Chip giggled.

“I speak with passion and conviction,” said Holly, “and a lot of peach schnapps.  Schnapps?  That word doesn’t sound right now.”

“Especially  _ peach _ schnapps. Peasch chnapps,” Chip said, enunciating.  She leaned over and kissed Holly, slipping her tongue gently between her lips.  “You do taste a little peachy.”

“Mmm… you just taste delicious.”

“Flattery will get you everywhere.”

“Chip?”  Now seemed like the moment, the two of them close and alone, and her tummy was fluttering with nerves at the thought of trying to ask for something more special with Chip.

“Mmm?”

“Do you want to come home with me sometimes?  Just you?  I’d like us to know each other better.”

“Ooh, I get the VIP treatment?  The backstage pass?  I’d love that.  Hey, I’ll make you dinner.”

“You don’t need to.  I’d like to do that for  _ you.” _

“No offence, but  _ can _ you cook?”

“Maybe not as well as some, but enough to feed someone I like.”

“Yay, treats with Holly!”  Another sweet wet kiss, and Chip’s hand slipped inside her robe to cup and stroke her breast.  Holly pressed closer, lightly sucking Chip’s lower lip and sliding her own hand under the blanket and inside the waistband of Chip’s boxers, squeezing the plump curve of her bottom.   _ I asked her!  She said yes!  She’s looking forward to it!  Eee! _


	10. Chapter 10

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> It's been so damn long! You might want to reread the previous chapter to refresh your memory. I hope you enjoy spending some more time with this version of the characters, which is honestly getting farther from the show all the time.

Holly woke to a dull red headache and a dry, metal-flavoured mouth, but on the other hand, to the smell of bacon and coffee.  She lay with her eyes closed breathing slowly and deeply as if she could absorb caffeine through the air until she summoned the will to open her eyes.  From the kitchen she could hear fat sizzling and utensils clinking on pans and Jay singing along with Carly Rae Jepsen on the radio. From the bathroom she could hear the shower running and the toilet flushing.  Close at hand she could hear murmurs, grunts and grumbling from disturbed sleepers. Right by her cheek Sharky was quietly muttering about the special place reserved in hell for people who sang “I Really Like You” early in the morning.  Without opening her eyes Holly turned her head and managed to kiss her on the corner of the mouth. Sharky subsided into surprised silence before gathering her into her arms and kissing back. 

“Don’t kill her,” Holly murmured, “she’s cooking.”

“Okay, but  _ only _ ‘cuz she’s cooking.”

“Wakey wakey,” Jay called out.  “Eggs and bakey.”

_ “How _ are you up?  And  _ cheerful?”  _ Sharky asked bitterly, rolling into the kitchen like a bear woken from hibernation, if a bear wore an old Brown teeshirt for pyjamas and no bottoms. 

“You can mock but I seriously wanted to use Holly’s bitchin’ kitchen again.  Everything just works. Plus when I get up and make breakfast for hungover people they pledge me their firstborn or at least they owe me a solid.  Hi babe, you sleep okay?” she added, leaning away from the stove to plant a kiss on Holly, who had padded in after Sharky clutching her robe together because she had lost its belt somehow.  

“Mmm,” Holly said faintly, trying to see without opening her eyes too much.  “Coffee?”

“In the French press,  _ mademoiselle.” _

_ “Merci, tu es aussi gentille que jolie.” _  Holly felt her way to the jug and poured a cup.  

“Holly Frenched me!  I didn’t know you spoke real French.”

“I thought she called you Angelina Jolie,” Sharky said, stealing Holly’s coffee and drinking deeply.  “Who no offence, you look nothing like.”

“I said ‘you are as nice as you are pretty.’  I think. It’s been a long time since I used anything but business French,” Holly said.  “Give that back, you horrible person.”

“Only if you call me a horrible person in French.”  Sharky held the cup above their heads, taking advantage of being taller. 

“I can’t remember how.   _ Tu es mauvaise. _  Or  _ méchante _ or something.  No, that’s just bad or naughty.  What’s horrible? Oh, for God’s sake, it’s just  _ horrible.” _

“Like, horrible with a French accent?  Orreebluh?” Sharky asked, topping up the cup before returning it to Holly.  

“Mmhmm.  Ohh. Mmm.”  Holly more or less immersed her face in the cup to breathe in the fragrant steam while she drank.  

“She’s making sex noises.  She needed that coffee,” said Sharky, opening the fridge and rummaging.  She came out with a bottle of orange juice and, miraculously, one of champagne, the sole survivor of last night.  “Yes! Mimosas. Fancy bitches drink mimosas for breakfast.”

Everyone gradually gathered in the living room in various states of dress and consciousness to eat off their knees or the coffee table. Between the bacon, eggs, toast, fruit and leftover Thai food it was quite a substantial breakfast and even the most hungover gradually revived enough to show some appreciation of what they were eating.  

“Three fucking cheers for Holly who provided us with this bounty and for Jay who cooked it up,” Skinny intoned, holding her glass of juice high.  There was a ragged, muted chorus of “Hooray” and “Amen.” “May we always wake up to such goodness after a night of such badness.”

“You and your badness are welcome here always,” Holly said graciously.  

“This could definitely become a tradition,” said Bunny, reaching across the table to help herself to more scrambled eggs.  

“You mean you’d like to have a sleepover  _ every _ weekend?” Holly asked.

“No way,” said Sharky, “‘cuz next weekend  _ we _ are taking  _ you _ out.  Don’t argue.  Kay is gonna take you shopping, get you something fun and slutty to wear, and Friday night we’re hitting the club.  We’re taking you to one of our favourite places. I wanna dance with you.”

“And then I wanna dance with you!” said Chip. 

“And me!”

“Me too!”

“Get in line, pal.”

“But I can’t dance,” Holly protested, “unless you count ballroom and I haven’t done that in years.”

“You keep having secret skills,” Jay said, leaning across Nina’s lap to poke Holly in the chest.  “You speak French, you’re a ballroom dancer, what else?”

“I’m not a  _ good _ ballroom dancer but I had to agree to those lessons to get out of the ballet ones,” Holly mumbled.

“Good for you,” said Nina, “ballet just gives you fucked up feet and anorexia.  Dixie, why the hell are you being so quiet? This is your thing. Her moms  _ run _ a Latin dance thing.  She could salsa before she could walk.”

“It might not be what Holly’s used to,” Dixie said.  “Plus, you think we’re going to salsa on a packed floor of people grinding?”

“I’ll clear a space for you,” Sharky said, punching the palm of her other hand.

“Shut up a minute,” said Jay, whose phone was ringing.  “Hi, Miss Christie.” Holly was interested to hear how her tone changed as she answered the phone; it wasn’t exactly that she was trying to speak more  _ properly _ but she sounded more respectful than she had heard her before.  “Oh really? Oh no. They okay? Yeah, thank the Lord for that. No, no, we can come, that’s no problem.  How many you need? Okay, I’m not sure how long it’ll take but I’ll give you a call when we’re like five minutes away.  That’s no problem, Miss Christie, you know you only have to ask. Okay, see you soon.” She lowered the phone and said to Beez, “Miss Christie needs us after all, Jason and Ant got stomach flu and they’re losing it from both ends.”

“Miss Christie did not say they’re losing it from both ends,” Beez said.  “Miss Christie is a  _ lady.” _

“Okay but she needs us to go down and help today.”

“Oh, fuck me.”

“Absolutely.”  Jay leaned across Nina again and said very sweetly, so that Holly couldn’t imagine how it would be possible to refuse her without having a losing it from both ends-level excuse or sounding like the most unpardonable of bitches, “Would you come with us too, Holly-baby?  We could really use another pair of hands.”

“To do what?” Holly asked uneasily.  

“No heavy lifting or hard labour, I promise.  Please, mamacita?” Jay actually fluttered her eyelashes.

“But you’ll hafta get your hands dirty,” added Beez, “and don’t wear anything you can’t stand to stain.”

“And it’s legal!” Jay added brightly.

They stopped playing it so mysterious once they had got her out of the house, leaving the others with promises of tidying up before they left and making sure the door was firmly shut and locked.  It occurred to Holly as they headed down to the subway that this hadn’t bothered her at all. The precautions she wanted taken were against unknown others.  _ That would be when they’d betray you, _ said the nasty untrusting part of her mind, but it went so far as to add,  _ if they were going to betray you.   _

“What are we supposed to be helping with?” she asked as they got onto the train, rubbing the last grain of sleep from the corner of her eye.  She didn’t feel equal to anything much, even after a second strong coffee. 

“Community garden,” said Jay.  

“With beehives!” Beez added enthusiastically.  She pushed up her sleeve to show the honeycomb tattoo inside her wrist, gold-and-brown bees crawling over the cells.  “My bay-bees.”

“Oh,” said Holly, “like a Michelle Obama sort of thing?  Growing fresh vegetables? Improving the urban environment?”

“Yeah, exactly.  Miss Christie’s been doing ‘em since the 70s.  They’re getting a new one going on a rooftop and she always needs volunteers.”

“You’re such  _ good _ girls,” said Holly.  

Beez snickered through her nose.  “Have you blacked out on last night?”

“No, I mean it!  You’re always doing these volunteer things.  I haven’t volunteered like that since I was at college, and it was expected of me there, I was in a sorority.”

“Oh cool — was it like  _ Legally Blonde?” _

“Uh,  _ no,” _ Holly said fairly decisively.

“Well, sorority means like a sisterhood, right?” Jay asked.  “We’re a sisterhood. Just don’t have a Greek name.”

“Nina has a Greek name,” Beez said, “but I don’t think Angelopoulos is that kinda Greek.”

“But you’re doing it all on your own initiative, is what I mean.  You’re doing it just out of  _ kindness, _ not because you’re required to or someone organises you into it, because it will look good on your transcript or résumé or whatever.  You must know that that’s impressive. It impresses  _ me, _ anyway.”  She turned her head to the left and the right to give each of them a kiss on the cheek.  Jay chuckled and took her hand, palm to palm, fingers interlaced, and Beez squeezed her knee and left her hand there.  They all lapsed into quiet as the train rattled on, and Holly leant her head against Jay’s shoulder. 

This sounded nice.  She had no gardening experience to speak of, but her mind sketched in a picture of greenery, neatly laid-out rows of lettuce and carrots, maybe some flowers, gently droning bees (hopefully not flying into her face; she wasn’t particularly scared of insects but she did hate it if they flew right at her face), all quite pretty and fresh.  If she explained that she didn’t have experience she probably wouldn’t be asked to do anything difficult or messy. Spending a Sunday with two girlfriends helping with a charitable project, well, that was something she could finally say if anyone on Monday morning asked what she did with her weekend. The sunshine wouldn’t do her hangover any favours but she had her sunglasses.  Yes, overall it sounded nice. 

It looked nice too when they got there, the flat roof of a big old renovated factory building whose new landlord was sort of bargaining away the impression of gentrification by establishing some goodwill with community organisers like Miss Christie, who was a very tall woman (somehow Holly had pictured someone tiny with a face like a walnut) who talked fast and with her hands.  She greeted Jay and Bee with hugs and kisses (and called them Jacinta and Beatriz, Holly was amused to note) before hustling off to direct someone else, clearly assuming they knew what they were supposed to be doing. 

“So?” Holly asked expectantly.  “What are we doing?”

“Ah,” said Jay.  “Well, the thing is, Beez is gonna be working with the  _ bees.” _

“Oh, clearly I can’t do that,” Holly said hastily, “so what about you and me?”

“And they need me down the far end, ya see where they’re still building the beds?  Wheelbarrows and sacks and stuff, and I figured that’s not really your speed.  _ But _ I thought you could help out with something less intense, right?”

Holly tried not to look dismayed, although she immediately felt left out.  The anticipated balmy day of light gardening together melted away and left her uncertain about even being here.  She looked around at the other busy volunteers and told herself she was being a snob to be so nervous of them, and probably a little racist if she was honest, and needed to pull herself together.  Knowing it didn’t help much. “What can I do to help?” she asked. 

“Okay,” said Jay, taking her hand, which was something.  “You see over there? Tisha and Katie need a little supervision, not a lot, just an alive adult.  You can help them get that bed planted out, they know what they’re doing.”

Holly looked where she was pointing and saw two little girls kneeling by one of the raised garden beds, deep boxes of soil that stood on the rooftop, examining a tray of seedlings in plastic cups.

“I can’t  _ do _ children,” she whispered to Jay.  “I don’t know what to do with them, I’m not — I’m not suitable.”

“What, are you gonna give them crack?  You don’t need a social work degree to talk to kids, you’re a decent person.”  Jay gave her hand a little squeeze. “Hey, I’ll tell you my top two secret kid hacks.  They’re both from one thing: most kids are nice. They like feeling like they’re being helpful and doing something good.  Even the pain in the ass kids. So one, if you wanna make friends with a kid, ask ‘em to teach you something. How does this work, show me what to do.  And two, if you do get one of those pain in the ass kids, they’re your new special helper. Give ‘em a responsibility. They  _ love  _ feeling important.  A lot of those kids never get any attention for being good but everyone needs attention so they’ll settle for what they can get being little shits.  If you’re actually telling them ‘great job’ and ‘thanks, I knew I could count on you,’ like nine times out of ten they’re your new best friend.” 

“If you think so…” Holly said uneasily. 

“And you don’t even have to use that with Tisha and Katie because they’re sweethearts,” Beez put in.  “Kind, responsible, maybe a  _ tiny _ bit bossy but hey, bossy girls get shit done.”

“Yes we do,” said Jay, grinning.  “C’mon Holls, you’re a bossy bitch.  You can be a role model.”

“Queen bee,” said Beez, and kissed her on the cheek.  “See you later, babes.”

“Here we go,” said Jay, and towed Holly over to the little girls.  As soon as they spotted her they bounded up with a cry of “Jay!” and started frisking around her like excitable puppies, telling her all about Tisha’s spelling bee and Katie’s basketball game and their idea for a video they were going to make tonight.

“That sounds awesome!” Jay said.  “You have to show me at breakfast club.  But listen, I want you to meet someone. This is my friend Holly.”

“Oh, hi Miss Holly,” said the taller one, who seemed to be Katie, and Tisha said, “Sup?”  Katie nudged her and she giggled. 

“Holly wants to help out with the garden but this is her first day so she needs someone to show her the ropes.”  Jay gave Holly’s hand a slight squeeze before letting go, and gave her a little encouraging nod that she guessed was her cue.

“Uh, yes.  I want to help but I don’t really know much about gardening.  Could you... explain what you’re doing here?” Holly faltered.

She was startled by how well it worked.  They took charge of her immediately, gave her a pair of cotton gardening gloves from a rubber-banded bundle and started telling her, tumbling over each other slightly, what they were planting today (broccoli) and how they had to space the seedlings out, how deep to dig the holes, how to fluff the roots of the seedling out a little after sliding it out of its cup, and so on with great enthusiasm.  She was crouching beside the vegetable bed watching a demonstration when she felt a pat on her shoulder and realised Jay was leaving her now she was settled in; she felt like a preschooler being dropped off, and she did  _ not _ want to be left with strangers any more than the preschooler did, but she wasn’t about to make a fuss.  Jay thought she could do this and she wanted to live up to that.

In her favour were the two facts that this really was a simple job, so she couldn’t mess it up too badly as long as she paid reasonable attention, and that Tisha and Katie could talk the hind leg off a donkey, so she didn’t have to think of many questions to ask them.  They asked  _ her _ a lot of questions, the sort that made her feel rather empty not to have kids or pets or brothers and sisters to tell them about.

“Are you Jay’s new girlfriend?” Tisha asked while they dug neat little holes with trowels.  

“Tisha!” said Katie.  Clearly Tisha was the audacious one of the two and Katie saw herself as a moderating influence.  

“It’s okay, Jay doesn’t mind,” said Tisha.  “Some girls like girls! Plus they were holding hands.  So.”

“We’re friends,” Holly said, feeling her face flame up.   _ They’re what, nine?  Why should I care what they think?  They think I could be. They’re not saying it’s ridiculous or weird or wrong.   _ “I — I like her very much.”  It just seemed wildly inappropriate to tell them anything more.

“Jay should have a nice girlfriend because she’s the  _ best,” _ Tisha informed her.  “She’s funny and cool and really pretty.”

“Oh, I agree with you on all points.  Could you pass me that cup?”

“And girls can get married now so they could have a wedding and we could be flower girls,” Katie said hopefully, plunking the seedling cup into Holly’s waiting hand.  

“With broccoli bouquets!” Tisha said, which cracked them both up.

“I don’t think Jay is thinking about  _ anything _ as serious as getting married at this stage of her life,” Holly said, involuntarily imagining Jay in a lavish white dress (with broccoli bouquet), but she realised as the girls ran on about how they would design the wedding that they weren’t thinking about anything that serious either, just about a big party or a kind of production like a school play.  “You two might have a future in events management,” she said.

“Yeah, we’re considering it,” said Katie, matter-of-fact.  “We wanna make videos but we also wanna put on concerts and stuff.”  That got them started explaining their whole future empire of entertainment, which if they achieved a tenth of it would be impressive.  There would be videos and competitions and fabulous prizes and music festivals, but theirs wouldn’t  _ suck _ like Fyre Festival because they would be  _ organised,  _ and they would do cool stuff for their friends for free, and buy their moms houses.  Holly thought of her own mother, last heard of  _ Eat Pray Love _ -ing her way around a variety of exotic locales, and suppressed a scowl.  It wasn’t that she begrudged her the opportunity to travel and have fun, but from the time she left home she had always felt baffled and stung by the way her mother seemed to think Holly should be happy for her being finally free of the  _ burden _ of a daughter.  As if there’d always been an  _ understanding _ between them that Holly was inconveniencing her and would get out of her hair as soon as possible, so she could get  _ on _ with her life.

_ Don’t take it out on the broccoli, _ she reminded herself.   _ Or the children. _  They seemed to be cheerfully oblivious to her mood, though, as they outlined their plans.  And the broccoli bed really was shaping up pretty nicely, with neat rows of green seedlings.  Once they were all planted they gave the bed a light watering before the little girls made a beeline for a cooler filled with melting ice and cans of soda.  They had earned one each, although Holly, by asking politely and not being a child visibly jonesing for more sugar, secured two more to take to Jay and Beez.  She set out looking for them, picking her way between the vegetable beds and volunteers with the cold cans clasped against her chest. Everyone seemed busy but the day was getting quite hot, so they were beginning to take breaks, seeking what shade they could find on the rooftop and sipping cold drinks.  

She couldn’t see Jay and Beez anywhere, and was starting to worry that they’d gone off somewhere without her when she heard Beez’ gleeful, dirty cackle from behind a shed that had been built to store tools.  Around it were stacked sacks of soil, mulch, compost and so on, and she had to work out how to pick her way around and among the fortifications they formed to get to the other side of the shed. She dropped one can and crouched to pick it up, cursing quietly and hoping it wouldn’t explode in foam when she opened it, and heard Jay’s voice too, the tail end of an indistinct comment in which she was sure she heard her own name.  

“Really?” Beez replied, and laughed again.  Still crouching between the sacks, Holly felt a qualm of doubt.  

“She was so funny,” Jay said.  “Looked totally freaked out.”

“Shit, I bet.  This is definitely not Holly’s scene.”

Holly shut her eyes, feeling her face burn.  She wanted to run away, but an odd thought stopped her.   _ This is exactly what happens in books.  How many times have I thought someone was a moron for overhearing part of a conversation about themselves, getting all upset and taking off without waiting to hear the end of it?  Heathcliff would have heard how Cathy really felt about him and wouldn’t have wasted his life being a miserable angry bastard. I should at least be more intelligent than Heathcliff.   _ She took a deep breath and tried to steady herself.   _ And if they do say something awful, well, I’ve heard it without them seeing my reaction.   _

“I was so proud of her, though,” Jay said, which immediately gave her some relief.  “She really tried, you know? She’s so not the snobby grouch she was when we met her.  This is one of those things that really proves it.”

“So she passed your little test,” said Beez wryly.  

“It’s not a test!” Jay protested.  “It’s just… one of those situations that comes along and you realise, seeing how she deals with this is gonna tell me a lot about her.”

“So... a test,” said Beez.  

“Not a  _ planned _ test.  Hey, she’s not used to doing any dirty work, and she seems kind of scared of kids, but she sucked it up and she did good.  Holly’s not just champagne and prezzies. She’s real. She feels like someone I can count on. Don’t you think?”

Beez snickered.  “You’re so wholesome.”

“Shut the fuck up.”

“Oh my!  Miss Christie hears that language!”  There was more giggling, and it sounded like they were swatting each other.  Holly’s face was still flaming hot but it had become a blush of flustered happiness.  Her eyes had teared up, and she hurriedly wiped them on her sleeve, then held the cold side of a can against them and then against her cheeks to try to cool them and take away the red.  The drinks wouldn’t stay very cold much longer. She took another deep breath, got up and found her way around to join them. 

“There you are!  I brought you a drink,” she said brightly.  They were sitting on the rooftop leaning back against the shed wall, and Beez was surreptitiously smoking a cigarette.  The surreptition might be because she was supposed to be a role model here, Holly guessed. Jay beamed and reached up to pull Holly down to sit between them.  

“You have a good time, babe?” she asked, and kissed Holly’s cheek.  She had a smudge of dirt across her nose and smelt of sweat and sunshine.  

“Pretty good, I think.  We finished the broccoli bed and I know more than I ever expected to learn about planning a future as YouTube influencers.”  Holly caught herself gazing at the way Jay’s throat moved as she swigged her soda, then caught Beez taking a photo of her gazing.  

“You’re so  _ smitten,”  _ Beez said.  She turned the phone and showed Holly the screen.  “Look at you, a coupla smitten kittens.”

“Eugh, I look so sweaty.”

“I like you sweaty,” said Jay, slinging her arm round Holly’s shoulders and squeezing as she leaned over to look at the screen.  “Yeah, that’s really cute. Send me that one, will ya?”

“Paparazzi,” Holly scolded Beez.  “You could give me some warning.”

“But then all I’d have is a shot of you looking at the camera thinking about how you look.  What I  _ want  _ is a shot of you looking at Jay not thinking about anything else in the world.  I collect pics of my friends being all lovey-dovey. When everything else feels like shit they comfort me, you know?”  Beez flicked through the phone’s screen to a photos folder labelled Life Is Not Shit and showed Holly the contents, shuffling them by with a practised thumb.  It was full of snapshots of hugs, kisses, tender gazes, sleepers in one another’s arms. Beez had embellished them with emojis and stickers and little fingertip doodles, initials interlocked or in hearts.  

Here were Ella and Kay sharing an umbrella, Skinny sleeping with her head in Carnie’s lap on a bench, Carnie looking tired to death but with her hand gently petting Skinny’s scruffy hair, Sharky talking tête-à-tête with a girl Holly didn’t know, but based on the intertwined R and S in the corner she thought might be Rochelle.  Rochelle had a thin freckled face with wide shining eyes that were upturned to Sharky’s face and her lower lip was just caught under the edge of her teeth. She looked adoring. For a second Holly caught herself looking for something masculine about her face before thinking that was unkind. Before she could think much more about that the picture skimmed by and was replaced by herself sitting on Jay’s lap, scarlet-cheeked and beaming, bulging out of that leather blazer.  

Then for some reason it was an elephant.  She blinked; an elephant and a small bushy-haired olive-skinned girl sitting in the curve of the elephant’s trunk as if it were a tyre swing.  Her face was stretched into a huge grin with a recognisable gap between her front teeth.

“Is that you when you were little?” Holly asked, quite charmed.

Beez chuckled, showing the same gap.  “Yeah, I was a lil’ goblin. I still miss Nellie.  I really loved her.”

“The elephant?  How were you on first-name terms with an elephant?”

“Oh, you don’t know Beez was in the circus?” asked Jay.

“Seriously?  Were your parents acrobats or something?”

“Well, not  _ in _ the circus,” Beez said, “not performing.  Mom and Dad did all the uncircussy stuff. Kept the books, took care of ticket sales, payroll, permits, organising publicity… but I played with all the kids whose parents  _ were _ acrobats and lion tamers and clowns, and that’s where I learned to ride a unicycle, juggle, eat fire…”

“Why on earth aren’t you still doing that?  It sounds fabulous!”

“Circus shut down,” said Beez, shrugging.  “It was animal welfare stuff. I mean, I don’t blame anyone, an elephant  _ is _ gonna be a lot healthier and happier if she’s got room to move and graze and she doesn’t hafta do tricks for a tent full of yahoos.  People  _ said _ they didn’t want there to be elephants and tigers and stuff in circuses, but when we retired ‘em, they stopped coming.  If you’re not Cirque du Soleil and all you’ve got for animals is dogs and horses, well… even Ringling’s closing down, and they outlasted a lot of little outfits like ours.  Nellie’s okay. She lives on a sanctuary for retired circus elephants down in Florida. I check up on her on their website, she paints pictures and hangs out with her girlfriend Patty.”  She flicked to another photo, two elephants in a grassy field with their trunks twined together as if holding hands. “Nice ol’ lesbian elephants who retired to Florida.”

“Aren’t all elephants lesbians?” Jay asked, leaning her chin on Holly’s shoulder.  “Like they live in all-girl herds and just let dude elephants visit from time to time so they can have kids?”

“Amazon elephants!” said Holly.

“Okay, Nellie and Patty are Amazons,” said Beez, sounding pleased.  “So yeah. Mom and Dad got out when they saw the way things were going and got into beekeeping instead.  Like mobile beekeeping. They truck hives around to farmers’ fields and orchards to pollinate the crops. So I learned that too.  I love bees, but after spending all my life on the road with my family, I wanted to try living in a city, and here’s where I ended up.”

“Our own homeschooled circus freak,” said Jay fondly.

“You know, Nellie and Patty were in a circus together when they were young, then it went bust and they got sold off to different circuses?” Beez said.  “Patty ended up in Florida first, then Nellie a couple years later. We went to say goodbye, kind of a reunion with the folks who stayed with the circus till the end.  Those two didn’t see each other for twenty years, but when they let Nellie out into the field where Patty was they spotted each other and they  _ ran _ to each other, and then they just stood there leaning their heads together and petting each other’s faces all over with their trunks.  Everyone was like, ya think they know each other? The sanctuary staff looked up their records and they were like oh yeah! I was all set to cry my eyes out saying goodbye to Nellie but I cried more when I saw how happy they were.  Nellie and Patty prove Life Is Not Shit.” She emphasised the point with four sharp taps on the back of her phone.

“I think that’s the most romantic thing I’ve ever heard,” said Holly.  She felt Jay’s arm tighten and her hand squeeze her shoulder. “Well, for elephants, anyway.”

There were sandwiches for lunch, contributed by a friendly delicatessen, and in the afternoon Holly’s little daydream did come somewhat true, as they spent the time together planting flowers the bees would enjoy, lavender, scarlet bee balm, catnip and purple coneflower.

“Chippy would enjoy this part, wouldn’t she?” asked Holly, pressing down the earth over the roots of a little lavender bush.

“She helped me pick ‘em out,” said Beez.  “If it was up to her the whole place would’ve been flowers.”  She swatted Jay’s hand as she snapped off a lavender flower. “Don’t  _ pick _ ‘em, those is for the  _ beez.” _

“Just a little something for my girl,” said Jay, and tucked the flower into Holly’s hair above her ear.  

“You are smooth as  _ fuck,” _ said Beez.

After helping clean up toward the end of the afternoon they rode the subway back together, heading for Holly’s apartment where the girls had left bits and pieces, including the unicycle.  Tired out by sunshine and unaccustomed physical work, Holly nodded off with her head on Jay’s shoulder and had to be gently nudged awake at their stop. She held Jay’s hand walking home, feeling oddly, contentedly like a sleepy child after a day out.  

The door opened on a scene of disarray.  For a heart-stopping moment she thought they’d left the door unlocked and she had been robbed until she realised this was just last night’s mess still in situ.  

“They all said they’d clean up,” she said in dismay, looking around her living room.  

“Sorry, I’d stay and help ya but I gotta baby-sit my cousin’s kid so she can go to work,” said Beez, darting around picking up a jacket, a plastic bag, slinging the unicycle up on her shoulder.  She kissed Holly’s cheek, then Jay’s with a quick “See ya, hon,” and she was gone. 

“Hey,” said Jay, kicking off her sneakers, “she made a  _ beeline _ outta here.  Huh?” She patted Holly’s back.  “C’mon, it’s not that bad.”

“But they  _ said _ they would clean up!” Holly protested.  All her sleepy-sunny good mood had burnt off.  “Look at this place! I don’t think they even started!  Skinny cleans for a living — did she just not care because she was off duty?”

“I think I might know the answer to that,” Jay said.  She popped through the short hallway to Holly’s room and stuck her head into the bathroom.  “Yeah, come see.”

The bathroom gleamed.  Every surface was clean and dry, every object was tidily arranged, there were fresh towels on the rail and a new roll of paper hanging by the toilet with its end folded into a little point, like a hotel.  “Looks like they picked rooms to do,” said Jay, “and Skins did a bang-up job like she always does but she wasn’t gonna pick up for the others if they bailed.”

“Then I only like Skinny now,” said Holly, folding her arms in a huff.  The contrast between the perfect bathroom and the bedroom behind her, with odd bits of clothing strewn about the floor, the bedclothes trailing over the footboard and the dried ghosts of multiple wet spots on the bottom sheet was especially galling.  “They  _ said _ they would —“

“I know, you said,” said Jay, looping her arms round her from behind and squeezing her waist.  “I bet they just forgot about the time till they realised they had to get going. Look, they did try a bit.  Someone picked up the empties in here.” She poked her toe at a lumpy black plastic garbage sack on the floor, which clinked.  

“They’re still slobs,” Holly grumbled.  “Now I have to spend my whole Sunday night picking up so the maid won’t think I turn into a werewolf and trash the place every weekend.”

“I’ll help you,” said Jay, “and it won’t take that long.  C’mon, don’t lose your mellow now. I’m having such a good day with you, this’s just a hiccup.”

“You mean you’re staying?” 

“Till you want me to go,” Jay said, shrugging.  “I will if you want, I just thought—“

“No, no, I’m  _ happy  _ you want to stay,” Holly said, twisting round to face her.  “Not just because I don’t have to clean by myself! I just thought you might be tired…”

“Nah.  Let’s get some more trash sacks and pick up all the loose crap to start with, okay?”

It didn’t take as long as Holly had feared when working in tandem, although that somewhat increased her irritation at the thought that even more people could have done the job faster.  Jay remained cheerful, actually humming as she roved around picking up garbage, pushing furniture back into place, throwing out leftover food that had been left on the table and kitchen counter all day, consolidating what was left in the fridge into some kind of order.  Making the bed with clean sheets was dramatically faster with one of them tucking in on each side.

“You know how I know you’re fancy?” Jay said, stuffing the dirty sheets into the washing machine in the little utility room off the kitchen.  “No schlepping down to the basement or out to the laundromat for the Duchess. You got your own washer and dryer right here.”

“Here.  After gardening  _ and _ cleaning here your clothes are all grubby.”  Holly slipped her hands under the hem of Jay’s teeshirt and lifted it up.  “Take them off.”

“It’s so cute you’ll still make an excuse to take my clothes off.”  Jay pulled her shirt over her head, shaking loose her tousled hair, dropped it on top of the sheets and smiled.  “Your turn. Piece for piece. You’re just as grimy as me.”

“It’s not an excuse,” Holly said, “I wouldn’t sit down on my own couch in this.”  She took off her own teeshirt, which had been sticking damply to her back and underarms after vigorously vacuuming, and dropped it in.  Jay stepped in to stroke back her hair with both hands and kissed her softly, continuing with light, gentle touches of her lips as her hands travelled to stroke Holly’s neck, her shoulders, over her breasts and under her arms to unhook her bra at the back.

“Doesn’t that feel better?” she murmured.

“Ooh, Beez is right about you being smooth.”

“You knew that, sweetie.”  She slid the straps off from Holly’s shoulders and down her arms, letting the bra drop to the floor.  “Ain’t I the one that seduced you?”

“Lucky, lucky me,” Holly breathed.  She undid Jay’s bra in turn, helped her off with it, and wrapped her arms around her shoulders, rising a little on her toes to kiss her and embrace her skin to skin, so very warm.

“We do both kinda stink,” Jay said with a smothered giggle.

“Oh God, I just gave you a waft, didn’t I?  With my arms up.” But it made her laugh too, even while she hid her face against Jay’s shoulder.  “Come on, pants off.”

“Ooh, she gets aggressive now!  You too, ya hussy. There we go.  That’s the stuff!” Jay tugged Holly’s yoga pants down from her hips while she was struggling with the button of her jeans, taking her underwear with them.  “C’mon, sweaty girl.”

They bundled each other out of their remaining clothes and into the shower; Jay yanked on the tap when they were both inside and they got an initial shock from the cold water that made them gasp and squeal before the hot kicked in, then simply clung together, kissing under the warm spray.

“Thank you,” Holly said quietly, stroking Jay’s wet hair back from her face.  “You are such a treasure. Will you… do you want to stay tonight?”

“Till you want me to go,” Jay said.  “I like being here, you know.”

“I want to spoil you.”

“You always spoil me.”

“But you’re not spoiled yet.”  She kissed the tip of Jay’s nose.  “So I have work still to do.”

“Would you  _ like _ me any more if I was all spoiled?  Hmm?” Jay raised one thick eyebrow.  

“Well, anyway, let me wash your hair.  That’s not really spoiling, right? That’s pampering.”

“Oh yeah.  And it’s hygiene!  So that’s  _ two _ good reasons.”

They washed each other, with care and with special attention to the areas that felt nice when rubbed and stroked.  Holly gave Jay a little lesson in operating the massage showerhead which ended in both of them needing a little sit-down, weak-legged and flushed with afterglow, the water playing over their feet.  

“I think I now have officially the cleanest pussy in town,” Jay chuckled.  “Unless maybe you do.”

“We waterblasted it,” said Holly, and got the giggles.   _ Sitting in the bottom of my shower, leaning against my darling girlfriend, naked, wet hair, bare face, it doesn’t matter.  I’m not drunk or high but I still feel good this way.  _

“I wonder what time it is,” Jay mused.  “I’m getting hungry. You wanna eat leftovers on the couch and find an old movie to watch before we go to bed?”

“That sounds like the best way I could possibly spend my evening,” Holly said with feeling.

Jay smiled at her, sweetly and lazily, drops of water beading her skin like sequins.  “I like playing house with you, Holly.”


End file.
